《Nightlanders :: A Cyberpunk Fairytale》 >> The Scramble-Faced Man Book One :: A Cyberpunk Fairytale
>> The Scramble-Faced Man
LOCATION :: Prosperity Tower - Pirate Controlled Free Nation Of Karrak. DISTRICT :: Mutagenic Quarantine Isolation Zone 454. Locally known as "The QIZ." WARNING :: PIRATE CONTROLLED DISTRICT. PROCEED WITH CAUTION. MUTAGENIC LOCKDOWN IN EFFECT.
A boiling pit of saw-toothed static hides the elegant mans unseeable face. Not a mask. Not a filter. A scratched-out, crack-toothed, hole in the universe. A photo with the face torn out - but real, and right in front of me. I feel the hum of it against my skin.... like a glitch in the world. A virus in the stuff of existence - eating away at the fabric of reality. Churning. Devouring.... Hope its fake. But there''s stuff that could do it for real. Science so cutting-edge it''ll cut your head off. Lost tek so darkly ancient, and alien, its beyond all understanding. Or, maybe.... maybe the world really is a lie. Maybe we''re trapped in VR and never really escaped the nightmare Facility that trained us. That place we called ''The School''. Its unnerving, whatever it is. But nothing like as bad as the voice, erupting around me. Sourceless. Wild. Biting my delicate ears with charred noise and rolling static, hammered into words I barely understand. But somehow, I do. I do understand. Like hes injecting the meaning directly into my head. Do you want to die? Normal kids would shift. Look away. But neither of us move. Our plan, does not include zait. Inflects the pale boy sat beside me in the tattered red-leather booth. Four, sharp, horns cutting free of the leathery hood to frame a smirking kitsune mask. Like he''s robbing a bank, but stopped at the bar for a drink. Beneath me, I feel a lions tail flicking against the sole of my foot. A nervous little tic - but, from his posture, youd never know. Hes just too still. Too calm, as he leans his cloaked shoulders back into his corner of the booth. Razor-edged claws of solid gold clicking a slow beat on the stained plastic table. Hes fifteen. Skinny. The closest thing weve got to muscle, by far. Our client aint impressed. I said. The glitching voice repeats. Do you want to die? I shiver tightly, flickering eyes round at what must be one of the rougher merc bars. Busted tables. Wall-to-wall thugs. Gangs in leather jackets. Hard-drinking degenerates with crocodile heads, and are those nipple piercings? My eyes snap back. Dont think thats likely. I drawl, cold and calm. We dont- He raises a hand, metal glinting up his sleeve. My own tail twitches as the man leans back - posture, calm. Missing face utterly unreadable behind the ''glitch''. Clearly weighing us. Is that so? For a long moment that silent, hidden, stare bores down into my heart. My eyes devoured by that shifting, sucking, hole where his head should be. That well of static and chaos. Taunted by flickers and twitches of colourless imagery. By eerie flashes of. I dunno what. Other places? Other times? Or just some old film or show, long gone? Echoes of a signal, lost in the white noise of the universe. Almost imagined, and too fast to follow. This is a covert insertion op. Doctor Scratch states, very finally. Every word rattled by buzzing harmonics. I need an elite team to retrieve a powerful originTek artefact. My sharp ears literally prick as my head tilts. Nose twitching. Yeah? Yes. Its a very rare Origin device. Tier Seven. A Tek Obelisk, to be exact. An electric blip inside my skull, and my implant opens a hazy blue vScreen in the air beside me. Showing me a gleaming square-faced pillar of pointed rock, glowing with odd sigils. Youre kiddin me. I mutter. Oh, Im not. There''s no joke here." That hole in the universe, leans forward. "This is why Im looking to hire the best team I can afford. They need to be discrete. They also need to be professional. They need. He leans further forwards. Slowly. As if sharing a secret. To not be children. My tail freezes mid-flick. I see. Don''t get me wrong - Im impressed with your ambition. He adds. Letting us down, so very delicately. But, you see, your team just lacks experience. And your cyberTek is crude communist junk- My mouth opens, but he cuts me off. -though Im sure its top tier in. some circles. My fanged teeth snap shut. Great. I admit," He adds, after a moment. "I dont know your skillset. You could very well be androids built for combat. Or refugees from some kind of. super-soldier program.? for all I know? Demon stiffens, but my eyes barely flicker. You could even be the best in The City. But, I''m afraid, it wouldnt really matter - you see. Because I care. I have a duty to care, in fact. My left ear tilts higher, and I frown. What? Which is why I dont, personally, feel comfortable throwing children into a meat grinder. He continues. Or even things that look like children. I dont think- I do. The static voice scours my ears, hissing with adamant anger. And then it fades, twice as quick. .sorry. He sits back again. I realise I''m spitting in the rain, here. The City devours children like candy. Especially out here." Gloved fingers flex. "But I am afraid I cannot, personally, bring myself put a- a minor at risk. I will not have your life on my conscience. I will not. It would be a poor joke, considering my profession. Which he hasn''t actually told us. But I can feel my shoulders slump. I know were done. But, like an idiot, I keep digging. Ya, okay, were a bit uh. young. I slip an irritable emphasis on the word. But were a bloo- a skilled outfit, packing decent cyberTek. And equip- Doctor Scratch raises a hand, right as Im pulling back my plain sleeve with razor-nailed fingers. Unveiling the custom-printed ebony armour gleaming beneath. There''s no sigh. No shake of his head. And no sorrowful face to see behind that brutal web of glitching noise. But it''s over - I can feel it. And I gotta fight to stop my ears snapping flat. For a second, I think it''s gonna go like the last guy - bombastic yelling, scoffing, and sneers of Dont you animals know who I am?? But, in a way, its worse than that. Im sorry. He says, instead. My research is priceless, and I have exactly one chance to acquire this item. My team must be the best. The very best. Goodbye. We- Wait- I start, but he cuts me off with a hand. Sliding out of our cracked booth. No. Sorry. I will be going. But I wish you good luck. Or, rather, very bad luck. I get a dim sense that there is a head, and its shaking. The kind where you never get a job like this. The kind where you. give up.. Maybe learn to weld meks. Or open a noodle stall, instead. Sure. I smile as cold bombs of anger rip through the basement supports of my soul. Later, therell be subsidence. A collapse. Screaming in the streets. But, for now, I prop the cracking ceiling and hope for the best. Good. He finishes. Smoothing off his pinstripe suit. Now. This is a delicate situation, so I hope you wont tell- We know all bout your situation. I state, cold as ice. Staring him down. Right in the middle of the bar. With Pirates and scumbags, and dodgy dealers pretending not to look. Doctor Scratch freezes, cold, and I hear his own supports begin to crack. Peeling a gratifying little chip of plaster off that elegant front. You- Fingers flex, but he controls himself. So. this really was a scam. In a way, Im glad. Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original. What? Wait- I start, but theres a sudden shimmer of static.. and hes gone. Just gone. As if he never was.. I sit there, for a second. Demon beside me. Then we both deflate - with a long, pained, sigh. Sliding, slowly, down the busted vinyl. Raising a claw, I flick open the image waiting at the corner of my eye.
Tek Obelisk (Tier 0 - Common Artefact) Threat Rating :: None. Purpose :: Decorative lamp. Value :: Low. Bounties :: None. Notes :: Originally thought to be part of a weapons system, Obelisks are now widely regarded as junk.
That bleedin liar. I growl as virtual screens unroll around me. Didnt even get to the bleedin pitch..... Or the surprise. I add, ripping our just in case smoke grenade off the underside of the table. Theres a small snicker in my ear, still crackling with static. Hard luck, mate. Our team''s [Drone Tek] chimes in over long-range comms. Linking in from the team vehicle. But, like - what can you do? We dont got a rep yet, yknow? Like, were total noFace round here? I shrug, staring at a particularly nasty bullethole in the grimy wooden wall of the tavern. Its suspiciously close to head-height. And, oh look. someone spilled their ketchup.. Funny. Didnt know this place served food. I say, as if testing the idea. It doesnt. Intones a far darker voice. A glitching mess of static, far deeper than anything Scratch could manage. It has an ice to it. A calculation. An inhumanity. I used to shiver. But I know, now, theres way worse out there in The Dark than our pet Machine Mind.. So I focus on the links it sends me, instead. No such thing as the Worldwide Web no-more, if it ever really existed. But the local (cobbled) Pirate-net burns its glorious, ghastly, orange directly into my synthetic eyeballs. I scroll through as quick as I can, dodging virusy pop-ups and ads. Looks like a hacked post on some black intel (as if theres any other kind here) site. Mostly just a buncha staticy forum images of Doctor Scratch, taken at a real distance.. A bunch of speculation, too. But, beneath it.. a wave of hot tips on his recent acquisitions. All, powerful originTek artefacts, by the look of it. We got a black-stone pyramid... thing... cut with runes and symbols. Leaking a weird green light, like it really is magic. And it may as well be, based on these rumours.... I scroll down, past some silvery orb with fins that hurts my eyes - even in photo. Past some necklace that lets you walk through walls.? Every one marked stolen. Last of all, pride of place, is a grainy vid-call posted by some Pirate [Hacker] called The_Rat. Weve got Doctor Scratch asking some unseen informant techy questions about future targets. All in codewords, too. He mentions something called The Gatestone.. Another called The Phylactery. And, in a deep and hesitant hush, a third one known only as.... "The Eye of Exodine....." A huge, digital, eye flickers into being beside me - wreathed with endless, osculating, triangles. Almost lost behind a maddening storm of numbers, calculations, trajectories, and symbols from some unknowable language. I will start making inquiries. Polybius ticks in my ear, with mechanistic rhythm. Perhaps we can. get ahead of things. Sod it. Go on then. I mutter to my implanted throat-mic. Barely moving my lips. Another voice hits the line: Rough. Dry. But still a girls. Want me to follow? A smile enters her voice. After all, its dangerous outside. All alone. Wouldnt want him having any mysterious accidents on his way home.. I dont so much as glance at our other table. Id just see a ragged girl in a hood, anyway. Maybe a bone-white braid, leaking out the side. A metal arm - or six. Maybe a clunky boot - or the massive, not-at-all obvious, lump on her back. The one about the size and shape of a tightly folded 88 calibre anti-materials rifle. Yeah, no. Better not. Its bad fbusiness." I hesitate. "And, ya know, just bloody bad in general. My fingers twitch - fretfully clawing the tape off our smoker bomb. Which eagerly promises to never be not sticky again. Guess were out a job, though, right? Chimes our [Drone Tek]. So. like.. any ideas? [Sniper] girl seems to consider this. Could scope Hells Bazaar again? We all wince. Ya serious?? After last time?? Seriously?? I choke off a low shudder. Legs yanked up. Tail wrapping ankles as I coil into a bestial hunch on the cracked vinyl seats. Bare, clawed, toes digging deep into naked foam and ruined plastic. Yeah, mate, gotta say - like - it aint named that for kicks? The drone-boy stutters. Sure, Zipper. She starts, but I cut her off. Nope. Don''t care. No thanks. Only way Im going back there is strapped to a nuke. A big nuke. Ysure, mate? The boy on the other line snickers. Like, I mean, that guy was gonna front me a lottta cash for your giblets. Not as much as Id get fer your skinny- I cough before I can stop myself - and Kami snorts. Damn throat mic - cant get away with nothin. God, what even are giblets?? And why did he even want em? Do I wanna know? Nope, mate. You do not. States Zipper the drone-tek. But, hey? Like. Youre gonna be back soon. Right? Could you grab us some like.... calzones, or whatever? Grab? Whut? The heck is a cal scone teas? I growl at the grenade, setting a passing barmaid to frown and stop. Nah, mate not... whatever you said? I mean, like, yknow? Calzone!" I can almost feel him gesturing. "Like, those folded pizza thingies? Yeah? With the melted cheesey meaty saucey stuff inside? Oh man, I could do with ten of em about now.. Huh. Sounds pretty bloody good, actually. Hey, Kami? You up for it? Yeah, sure. Whatev. [Sniper] girl grunts, across the bar, pretending to sip the same fake hologram drink shes been pretending to sip for an hour. And it''s still sorta weird hearing her whisper, when youd not hear her shout over this mess. Yeah! Alright! Good to go! Zipper gushes back, excitement bubbling. Youre in for a real treat here- Zipper. I hope to bugger ya checked this joint - whatever it is. Specially after The Burgerland Incident. I do the air quotes, despite the lack of camera. My implants translating the motion onto to my miniaturised avatar, back at our mobile base. Heck, I still think that kiddie meal had real kid in it- A glowing maze of cubes burst into being beside me, multiplying and shrinking to build a hyper-realistic digital ghost. Solidifying an Asian-ish boy with punky blue hair, and torn-off sleeves - which blur forward, planting gleaming blue-nailed hands on the edge of the table. Or, rather, through it. Mate! Hey! Hey! C''mon! Not this again! Yeah? Like, I mean, I totally checked it. Alright? It was simMeat, like they said. Like, real good stuff too!" "-Zipper-" "-I do my research, yknow? Its all checked out, and- He drops his head - shrouding half of it in a long woosh of neon-blue fringe, shredded with silver. Look, like, I know I- Hey, I believe ya. I promise - meeting his CG eyes. Though its gotta look like Im talking to nobody. ''Specially to the maid, still craning her head in our direction and walking back and forth in a very slow and totally non-suspicious way. But the kid nods in relief. Fake virtual light shimmering on the implant slapped in the shaved side of his skull. Ill risk it if he does. Kami volunteers, bravely. Zip just rolls his. Like, come on Kam. Yknow Ill. I wave em off. Alright, alright. Well send ya a foldy pizza by drone-drop. Jus lemmie know watcha want on it. I frown. Well, uh, in it I guess. Awesome, mate!! Ill have, like, everything! Zip grins, with a smirking salute. Pepperoni. Kami intones, as if pronouncing judgement. Eyes still stuck on her drink, no doubt. That it? Zip sighs. Aw, come on, like. How bout that monsterMeat? Right? Or.... Oh, hey, y''know they still got simVeg out here! Yknow? Peppers, mushrooms, olives, garlic?" He gestures, and some anonymous colourful chunks appear. 3D printed food-blobs that ain''t seen the same century as a real vegetable. "Oh, and, like. chocolate milkshake, fries, and.. Yeah, what? The blue fringe flicks as he glances right, nodding to nobody. Ah, yeah! Badger wants. okay, wow, slow down yeah? "Just send me a big ole list. I hesitate. And, uh, keep the lil idiot in check. Alright? Nothin too freaky? Yeah? Zips hand flickers. Not a glitch - but speed. Mate, like, trust me - nobodys less ready for gummiebears & liquorice meatballs than me. Or- Chocolate-covered curly fries in a sour gummie-bear sauce. Kami supplies, with enduring horror. And ketchup. Green ketchup. We share a shudder-cringe of true horror as the waitress comes sidling back. Ear bent toward us. Or near us? My eyes narrow, slightly. Brows low. Ah, yeah mate, no worries. Ill keep shortie in line. Zip coughs, starting me back into the convo. Copy that, Blue Bastard - target confirmed. You take the bar, and Ill blast the help. I chuckle as the maid literally jumps - scurrying back toward an empty table. Which she does a terrible - but frantic - job of mopping. Like shes trying to bore a hole dead through it by sheer force of friction. Hah, yeah - like, roger that! Calzones! Lets get going! Zip beams, practically hopping. Ah, wait! We should ask Demo- I start right as a set of metal-sharp claws dig into my armoured arm. We go. Now. Hisses the horned shape next to me. Yeah, yeah - were goin. Soon as- Kah! No! Not soon! Now! Demon growls, throaty and inhuman. Square pupils scanning the room through his fox mask. He twists in the seat - fluid, and dangerous. Bladed digits digging deep into fake leather. My eyes widen, and I flick my fuzzy ears to the room - augmenting the sensitivity. Ive got bar staff chatter. Drunken mumbling. Illicit deals.. But nothing aimed at us. What did he feel? Or hear? I blink as a second, identical, barmaid blows past us - both veering to scrub the same round table. Wait a sec. My head pivots, right as a third identical maid-clone stops behind us. Mid-stride. Staring at her doubles. Almost like she aint used to being a triplet.. Oh- Oh Hell!!!! Zips virtual eyes widen at an unseen screen, and he glitches around. Mate!!! Somethin going down!!! Too. Late. The maids yank pistols from nowhere. Flicking em up to hammer the booth beside us. No words - no time. I duck back into cover, right as flames explode from the sides of their guns. Rushing down the barrel. Ejecting high-energy rocket-propelled bullets that drill their way into the booth. WHAP! WHAP! WHAP! And then theres just silence. The stink of burnt propellant. The killers whoop - bumping skin, and dancing about. Fists glitching as their real hands impact, under the hologram disguise. I glance at Demon, who looks about ready to bolt - or fight. Kami is a frozen shape - half outta her seat. I lick my lips. Every eye on the killer duo and their smoking weapons. Which is right when their target get up. Slowly. Revealing a mile high bastard, built of metal. Eyes mad with hate as steel-armoured fists crack the table. Sparks and rocket-smoke pumping from bloody dents in his chest. And I wonder what these clowns were thinking. You. Two. The metal man grins like a maniac, his chrome-steel jaw sharp as knives in profile. Ye got me frukin attention. Now what ye gonna do? The whole bar goes deadly still. Every hand touching a weapon. I swallow. > > >< < < >> Assassination Protocol >> Assassination Protocol
## battleTek System Self Diagnostic: Complete ### ID: ''Spook'' Armour Systems: Online. Movement Servos: Primed Battle Stim Injector: 94% Healing Injector: 56% Remote Suicide Switch: ERROR! TAMPERING DETECTED! VIOLATION REPORTED! ## Glory to The Great Leaders! Glory to the neoSoviet Empire! ##
Mate. Zips digital ghost hisses in my ear, low and warning, as my eyes flick across the frozen bar. The main floor cleared in half a second as regulars step back from their tables. A rising wall of thugs in spiky black jackets locking Kami into her corner table. Spreading a massive, empty, space around the fake barmaids that traps us right in our booth. Into that huge void, steps Mr Chrome. Bullet-holes smouldering in his cyberTek skull. He twists his neck with a metallic crunch, and stabs a finger upward. Instantly, every light explodes with sparks in our little section of the bar. EMP! I hiss as my robotic eyes jitter with static and noise. They''re shielded - thank bloody God - but barely shielded enough, as it turns out. It clears quickly. Right in time to see both maids glitch out. Holograms dying in a waft of plastic smoke, and a sad pop of dying projectors. Silence looms, and I hunker inside it. Our entire section in darkness, haloed by stuttering lights. Now. Aint that better? Chrome growls at his killers - who turn out to be your typical tattoo-chick-plus-hairy-biker combo. Mid twenties, ish. Matching names inked on their inner arms - giving me a Bruno and Tina. The shock on their faces is wild. Pistols still raised, but shaking. I lean to Demon, almost butting his horns. Lets slip out, quick, while theyre talkin. I mouth over comms. Bad idea, mate. Like, really bad. Look at the crowd. Zip warns, twisting at one of his fingers. The wall of eyeballs pointed our way, ya mean?" Im tryin not to. Yeah, mate. You move, theyll think youre in on it - and bam. He stutters as I flick a look across the merc bar, now it''s easy to see. Layout screams ''former diner'' - from the circular tables, to the walls lined with old red-leather booths. Each and every bloody one jammed with eager-faced patrons, ready for a show. All cybered-up gangers, mutated Gone Wrong thugs with eyes on their elbows, and eerie men in rough suits - hoisting viciously calculated stares. The croc crook from before swirls a huge beer in one scaly paw, while a second supports his chin. A third arm looped round some octopus-faced thing with boobs. Craaap. I groan, sinking deeper into my haunches. Seriously? They all wanna get caught in the crossfire or what? Nah, mate, its all for Face. Zip explains in rising panic. Eyes flickering across an augmented-reality model of the bar generated by our cameras and eyes. Likely to cover the fact he''s launching fast drone support. Like.. Yknow? One guy bolts, you know they''re a coward? Right? That they dont belong? Its a bloody game? I meet Demons sharp eyes. Stay put n'' pretend it''s a show, or get called a sissy? Got it in one, mate. Great. I hiss, trying to un-slide from under the table, while pretending we were never down there. Just listen. Kami grunts, clinking things shifting under her cloak. She looks calm. Intent. But one of her steel-spike boots is twitching under the table. I nod. Flicking my ears back to the stand-off. -thought yed ge lucky, eh!? Chrome snarls, ramming a finger of jolly violence into our lucky pair in time to his words. But yewre in a spot of bother naw. Aint yeh? Thinkin yeh oughtve picked a bigger gun. Eh? He leans in. Or maybes a smaller target. Eh? Phhh. Were a little impressed, oh great King of Olde. Tina sneers the name of the gang, stepping to flank him. Pistol dangling from one clipped finger. Dermal armour. Right? Good in a bullet-storm. But. Her eyes drift down. Bet it makes a guy stiff in. just.... all the wrong places. Her eyes flick lower, then back up to his - with a smile. And I smell something up. Shes way too cocky. Like it''s all going to plan.. Bet my Bruno is twice the man you are. That so? Chromes massive head twists at Bruno. Analysing structure. Cracks the shifting voice of Polybius in my ear - virtual diagrams unfolding from Chrome. Estimate body composition is 90% mechanical. Fake skin over titanium composite skeleton. Likely all organs are removed. Leaving the brain, alone, to be encased in a life-support shell. Scans required to confirm. Dang. Thats basically mil-spec kit. I hiss as that monstrous cyborg chastises the scrawny flesh-man. Come on! Show him Bruno! Tina hisses. Do I look like a holoMonster card to you? Bruno hisses back, a titter of laughter rolling through the crowd. Onlookers signalling theyre a group. All part of The Face. Chrome-y turns to his goons. Yeh think we oughta skin em before we kill em? Eh? He raises an arm, and the crowd roars blood and mayhem. FLAY EM! RIP HIS NUTS OFF! And it only gets less polite from there as black-jacketed Gang enforcers peel outta the shadows. All spiky shoulders and killing eyes. A few flexing claws - or spiky tails. Or metal fists. But, behind Chrome, rises the worst. A sliver-thin creature. All languid paws and razor claws, wrapped up in slick black fur. Face like a jackal, but covered in bony spurs - like thorns - and speckled with gleaming metal implants. A slick melding of sinuous creatures. It almost screams ''artificial'', but it screams ''danger'' a whole lot harder. It''s a GMO, like us. But not a human-faced half-half, with funny ears and a fuzzy tail. No. It''s a full blooded Pure. More monster than human. More fang than smile. Shiiii- I hiss. Kami, where are ya? Where. do you. bloody. think? She grunts as her white dot is forced back across my mini-map by the surging crowd. Trailing insults and metal elbows as she fights to stay in the far corner. Safe - for now - but trapped. I swallow, and my guts knot. Fretful claws still picking tape off our smoke-grenade, under the table. Like it matters what it looks like.... Mate. Like, dont panic. Yeah? Zips digital ghost flaps its hands up into a blur. Like, stay still. Right? They aint after us. Right. I mutter as the jeers hit an ear-drilling crescendo. "Not yet, they ain''t." Least, they don''t know about the bounty.... Chrome raises a fist for silence. With a showmans smile. Im likin a buncha these suggestions, boys n girls. Specially that bit with the pliers n'' their delicates.. The gang whoops, but. That killer pair keep smirking around at people. Smug. Cocky. Almost winking. Brunos gun tapping his elbow as Tina goads them all with gang-signs. The crowd screams, and Bruno cheers em on. "Somethings up. Y''see it?" I hiss. Its almost. like they know.... theyre gonna win..? COME ON THEN! TRY IT! Bruno yells. Were Hell''s Bloody Reapers! And our crews gonna make a show outta YOU.!! Chrome laughs, like a stalling engine, spinning his arms around. OH YEAH!? An where are dey den? They hidin behind mine? Somethin like that. Biker girl smiles, slipping behind Bruno. And my eyes flick to the crowd itself. Widening. Oh Hell. Is as far as I get before the jackets at the back pull massive, skull-headed, knives - slamming them into the necks and backs of the guys in front. Butchering ten or twelve of the weaker goons in seconds, and spraying the ceiling with blood. Pandemonium. The chaos is instant. The shock is incredible. Even Chrome pausing - wide-eyed - which gives Bruno and biker girl a precious few seconds. They raise their heavily etched guns. Smile for The Reaper. She purrs, and flames roar from vents in the sides of their guns. Rocket-bullets smashing off Chromes face. And I feel death coming.... for us. Time slows as the bullets carve spinning, corkscrew, whirls of smoke across the bar. All my adrenaline roaring free of its cage as I twist - grabbing the back of our bench-seat. My feet kick leather, and I flip clear over the back. Right as the first bullet hits that titanium face, and ricochets. Veering right at us. Fluff explodes from my seat as I hang there, mid-flip. Then my skinny weight carries me over down - clawed toes slapping, hard, onto scarred table. Right between some sketchy dudes - who weren''t near as quick. I flip again, as they jerk to the tune of the bullets above. Grabbing the next divider, and twisting my body into a second flip - and over. Wind rushes in my furry ears - and I pat down, safe, onto the next table along. Rolling off, down, onto the long bench seat. Sliding under it - coiled and ready. Half a micron later Demon lands beside me in a flurry of yellow tail claws. Horns twitching. Strands of gold leaking from his hood. Shit, Zip! This is nuts! Gimmie a way out! I say very, very, calmly. I mean, considering I nearly got shot. If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. Mate! Im working on it! But, like, theres like - a whole mess out front!? Uh.? I flick a look round the corner as that big Chrome bastard steps into the hail of bullets. One boot after another. Backing the pair right up into a central table. Then round it. Into the middle of everything, where everyone can see. A shadow flicking to his right as that Jackal-faced GMO slips around Bruno, right as he fumbles a reload. A fuzzy footpaw, loaded with claws, kicking hard into the back of Brunos knee. Smashing it into the ground, and slashing backward. Ripping. Bruno''s scream is shrill as black clawed fingers bury themselves in the side of his head. Twisting his face into the hard edge of a table like a big, fat, wet, hammer. CRACK. Oops. Says Chrome, conversationally. Bruno hangs limp from the Pure GMOs grip, and his girlfriend scream pitifully. Spinning to confront it, pistol out. But The Jackal stares her down with genocidal intent. Fixated on her face. Twisting its own, side to side. Muzzle to gun-muzzle. Spindly arms sliding around her. She fires. Jackal thing twists its head - and she twists with it. Bullets smacking a river of fire off its jaw that blasts along the cheek. Burning fur. Bruising skin. Hammering teeth. But rockets suck up close. They slap off its skull - spinning trails of smoke, right into the onlookers. Gaining speed until- Whap. One punches through a dude, and drills the wall. He blinks in shock - blood blooming as a glass slips from his hand. His friends grab him. They scream. And everything goes to absolute crap in half a second - guns rising as bladed shutters guillotine the bar. Mass panic. Maids piling into their panic room. Bullets everywhere as regulars join the fray. Time to bloody go! I rip my hood off, and the mask with it. Sections of gloss black armour peeling off my back. Ripping through my loose shirt as they slide up to cover my neck in armour. Tiny arms grab my ears, and fold my hair as segmented plates lock tight to my skull. Three curved blades of bullet-proof plastic snapping together in front of my eyes.
Helmet: Activated. Armour: 95%
With a twitch of my wrist, a web of tactical vScreens unfold from nothing. Info shared at blistering speed within the linked world of our implants. Ive got external cameras, plus a few left inside. All fully hacked and controllable, thanks to over-preparing. My vision jinks as Kami and Demon gain coloured outlines. 3D maps of the bar overlaying my vision, with dots for us and the patrons. I flick that away, and crick my neck. Its a big ole room. With all the original furniture- CRASH. -most of the original furniture. Plus two exits, front and back. One ahead. One to the right. Backs an unknown - the doors locked. Could be storage. Could be a way into the old drone tunnels. I twitch toward it in a whisk of tail - and damn near get my nose chewed-off by a wall of bullets that sets me darting back under the table. Thickest fighting has swung hard into that door as half the patrons grab at the same idea. But my enhanced eyes flip to the other side of the room. Front door is directly ahead, like a taunt. Just past the bar, but lighter on the scrum. Kami. Were bustin out the front. Youre closer. Try tmeet us there. On it. She grumbles, and Demon twists behind me. Shredding his way over the back of the seats in a golden-clawed fury of feet and leonine tail. .glad we aint paying for that. I grumble, slipping out the booth on all fours. Taloned toes and sharpened fingers clicking across rough paint. Bumpy. Uneven. Flecked with gleaming-wet shards my street-toughened pads ignore. I duck under a table, working my way forward. Direct to the door - while horn-boy traces the left edge of the room. Using the booths for cover. Shiit. What''s he going to do at the bar? It sticks out, right to the left side of the door itself. Nothing but battered stools, and- Spook, you must hurry. The metal voice of Polybius scars itself across my senses. [Unknown persons] have attempted to trigger the bars [autogun defences]. I am blocking them. For now. Oh Hell. I cant see Kami. Hell, I can barely see the fight - what with all the gyrojet bullet-smoke. The spitting fire. And just the utter storm of jostling legs, as two furious gangs trap the regulars and randoms in the middle of their war. Patrons fighting to escape, or for vengeance, or for the sheer bloody love of mayhem. The whole thing rotating around Chrome himself - who leans back, right middle of it all. Lighting a tiny cigar with his thumb, as he rests his ass on a table. As if all the world were a show.. I jolt sideways as a thugs boot stomps right where my fingers were. The guy leers down, and I snarl as it swings up for my face. Guess some just want to hit stuff, and they don''t much care what. He stomps again, glass still in hand, and I stab claws deep into the top of the boot. Twisting - rip - then twisting back. Loosing a scream to split your head - plus a second boot, flailing and stumbling. I bounce back on my haunches, then slam at him from the side. Hes heavy. Fat. Panting. Red of face - and leg. But Im light, limber, and I hop one foot right up onto his arm - kicking the sharp toed other into his squishy chest. He gasps. He chokes. And five more rip at his eyes as he stumbles back. Swaying, limping, and starting to tumble. I help him on his way by kicking off him, into a flip. Bullets screaming past my face as as I land - crouched, and snarling - beside the table. Slipping back under. He screams at me. He calls me names, rolling about on the floor. And thats how I know Ive won. A subtle shift, and Im around him - the fight roaring in every direction. Claws. Teeth. Guns. Metal fists impact face - and, wow, jaws are not meant to twist like that. Its manic. A maze of stomping legs and lizard tails. Spiky fists. And some guy with a raygun that lights things on freaking fire. A female thug slams into me, and her eyes go slick-sharp. Pistol twisting up to murder me. I dont wait for the shot - I jink right, and claw her hand away with a swipe. Grabbing the barrel with my other, and kicking hard off her chest. She stumbles into the scrum, and - hey - free gun. But she''s righting herself, fumbling another. Damnit, I could flee- but she''s right in the way of the door. So I leap - and her panicked bullets fly. One smacks my armour, like a fist - carving a white-hot track across my chest. And then my heels slam all the breath clear out her lungs, and I swing the butt of her gun right into her chin. She swings the gun at my face, and I punch hers into a table-leg. Knocking her half-way to Neverland. I flip the gun she ''gave'' me, grabbing it by the handle. No time to find the other - I blocked on reflex, and now it''s off under the tables. Rolling off, and back into cover, I check my map. Demons dot is halfway to the door - still following the left wall. Like I bloody should have. We converge as he dips out of cover to bolt past the shuttered bar - all art-deco red, and glorious chrome. Once, it would have sat in front of a whole wall of windows. Now- A patron blurs over my head, and impacts the heavy shutters with a massive bang, rolling off em onto the booths beneath. Shuddering me all the way through. The Jackal lands on the table above me. Snarling. Bloodied. Dripping. Raw with primordial musk, and animal fury. It drops from the edge. Prowling toward the windows, and its prey..... I swallow, and its head snaps to me. Low and ready, with its swollen face. And bloodied claws of sparkling metal. A baby. It breathes, in a gory hiss. A cub. I go very still. Freedom beckons - right at the end of the bar. I dont look. Don''t breathe. I focus, instead, on the jarring thump of my heart. The stillness of the monsters paw. The drip of red that slips down fur. It laughs, and snaps its head away. Playful, and bubbling with murderous glee. I bolt - crashing past Kami on the way. Her hood snaps toward me. Evil slashes of ink carving a mad smile from the cold void of her blank, white, mask. Her steel-studded boots planted on the back of a struggling ganger-girl. We goin? She growls, many thin metal arms slipping back into her cloak. Sliding for guns. For bombs. For knives. I twitch my ear toward the exit, and she nods. The three of us converging to- And thats exactly when it all goes knackers up. Outside - a bang. A scream. A howl of engine, ending in a blunt crash of metal that shudders the entire bar. Ending in a wild shout of THERE! THEYRE IN THERE! Gunfire roars across the shutters like rocket-powered rain. I bounce back from the door as a wall of blue-shirted thugs come blasting their way in. A third gang!? Oh Hell.. I growl, and we bolt back along the bar - right at The Jackal. "SHIIT!" I slam us to the right, into the first booth behind the bar, and under its table. Sandwiched between the fight, the ringing shutters, and everything else. Its terrible cover - but look at our options. Demon hesitates, leaping out to drag a central table onto its side. Wedging us in. Cozy. But not exactly bulletproof. Virtual windows unfold around us. I see most of the bar - but outside? Smoke cut with neon, billowing across our hacked cameras. A mess of shadows, lights, and chaos. Inside - the fight is turning. The newcomers beaten back into the tiny entryway by the bar. At the last second, one raises a rusty stick-like SMG, and hoses one entire side of the room. Tiny 22 calibre rockets busting off Chromes face. Irritating him no end, I''m sure. But with a simple gesture, his entire crew swivels - like he pinged some kind of implant. Each and every one focusing their fire directly on the doorway. Several go down. One flees. And everything goes silent, as the whole dynamic of the bar starts to change. Chrome steps forward. Slowly. Calmly. Grabbing the fallen Bruno by his damaged neck, and yanking the now-bloodied biker chick from under a table. He pulls em upright. Her clutching a hole in her side. Him still dazed - choking on the ruins of his face. For a long beat, he says nothing at all. The whole bar fixated on either the door or the toughest bastard in the room. A heartbeat. Another. And then, we catch it - a whisper so quiet it carries to every ear in every corner. What. Did. Yeh. Do. The monster growls, a spice of anger breaking his rocky calm. Its not a question. He already knows. An old Comms chip slips from her hand. Tinkling on the floor. EMPs dont work if its off. She grins. But Chrome slams her head on to a table. Wordless. Bruno dangling, ignored, in his other hand. What. He says. Did. Ye. Do? Called backup...." Biker chick whispers, eyes almost blank. Lips barely moving. "Then.." A broke-toothed grin. "....told .. your friends on Fourth Street. you was having trouble. Didnt I? She''s barely with us, yet she shivers my hackles with the danger in her tone. Chrome smiles. You did, yeah? Yep. She slurs. And now you gonna die. Even you cant fight two gangs at one.ce. She spits blood in his face, laughing through the pain of her tearing wounds. A dark and strangled sound. Chrome lets her finish. And then the monstrous man crushes their necks to paste. Damn-near shearing their heads off. The necks stretch, and then he drops them. Discarded, like old tin cans. Thunk.. .thunk. Cowards n scum. Is the only eulogy they get. I claim yer useless gang. Any ya freaks wants out, theres the door. A bright, metal-toothed, smile glimmers about his lips. If yeh can make it out. My eyes snap to it in desperation - but I ain''t fool enough. And what the Hells going on outside? Spiky shadows lash the coloured smoke beneath my cameras. A leather jacket whipping past, baseball bat swinging. I catch a punk in a blazer. Flashes of rocket-fire. A grenade that whites the screen.. Piss off! Snaps a mohawk man, ripping open his jacket. Revealing an augmented chest inked with gang tattoos. We dont work for you. We work for The Reaper. An yeh leaders got reaped. Chrome paces around the room to face the man. A circle of thugs and regulars clearing around him. Cowards. The monster sneers, as I hunker deeper into our booth. Sharing a nod with the other two. "Time for the big guns." Kami mutters. Polybius. Code Delta-Delta. I breathe. Please stand by. Cracks the eerie static voice. Chrome grips the mans jacket with bloody metal fingers. Yeh boy here got balls. Ill give im that. Big ole brassies. The goon swallows, eyes flicking. Now. Yeh think Fourth Streetll care whose wiv me when they get in ere? N-n- The mans eyes stick to the blood on the hand. Exactly! The leader roars. Everybody stands, or everybody dies! Thas how it is! Always will be! He squeezes, very slightly, and even over the crashes and screams outside I hear that jacket creak. So get yer asses in line, or were gonna have problems. He lets go, and turns away. Polybius? I hiss again. I have full control of the network, such as it is. The EMP fried large parts of it. The rest is borderline salvage. Shit. How many I got? Five units out of twenty survived. .good enough. Ready? I grunt, popping the little metal panel in the side of my head. Slotting something into the main port with a thunk that echoes round my skull. WARNING - Internal Security Breach. Intones a crude synthetic voice. Wireless brain Uplink established. L.M.G. property has been opened to hack- hack- The voice glitches to death - subsumed by that eerie symbol built of eyes, and grids, and triangles. Patching you in. It intones. Please stand by for neuroJump. I nod to Demon, and he pushes me into the back of the booth. Hunkering protectively. I shut my eyes - a string of data welling up the side of my screen. Jump in ten. Nine.. Thisd be so much better with Zipper- A half dozen thugs with reaper-skull shirts and spiked blond hair blast their way in through the front. Laying into the jacketed Kings with ornate guns and knives. A cheer roars up from the Reapers, Chrome SNARLING as the truce comes to a sharp and bitter end. YER BOSSES ARE DEAD. SO WHO D''YEH FIGHT FOR? He roars, hurling the dead pair right in their faces. Raising a thick metal finger. "YEH CAN''T TOUCH ME! YEH KNOW IT!" Six. Five.. The new Reapers balk, trapped between Chrome and the roaring cry of "FOURTH STREET GONNA KILL YA!" Chrome smiles. A reaper yells "TO THE BLOODY DEATH!" A gun fires. And Polybius says One." Instantly, everything slows as my mind is ripped clean out of my body. Colours and lights blasting through my being. Connecting me, like threads of wire. Harnessing my brain, as if it were a computer. I open my many eyes. And I become the building. > > >< < < >> Master Of Puppets >> Master Of Puppets
## WARNING! IMPLANT DETECTS CRITICAL SECURITY BREACH! ## ## CORE SYSTEMS COMPROMISED BY :: [UNKNOWN]! ## PROTOCAL ACTIVATED :: [PROTECT NEOSOVIET SECRETS] ## SELF DESTRUCT :: [Activated] ##.... ## ERROR! CANNOT SELF-TERMINATE!
Uplink stable. Intones the vast weight of The Machine Mind, analysing my brain with a clockwork eye. I feel the pulses of data thread through it - burning my entire being. My rewired mind plugged, directly, into Building Security via my complex network of implants. And, through it, my awareness spreads to fill the bar. Chasing along cables. Filling electric nodes. Its cameras become my eyes. My mouth, the shutters and the doors. My tail the. menu board? I waggle it, changing all the prices. Huh, neat. Oh, yeah. And theres one more thing. Five heavy turret-guns crack their EMP shielding, punching directly through hidden panels in the ceiling. They form a rough circle of the room. One by the loos, one near the bar, two by walls, one above the shutters. I twist my body, and they shift like a five-headed hydra. A few thugs notice - eyes bulging wild. Mouths opening. But half a second before any can react, I line up the shot - and fire. Punching a magnetically-driven steel-core slug through Chromes right arm - cleaving it off at the shoulder. Shattering the table behind it. Burying that slug deep in a gouged crater of tiles and dust. The cyborg turns, slowly, as sparks and glowing fluids rain from his stump. Shock burnt into every micron of his bullet-scarred face. Slowly, a lump of scrap peels free from a thread of synthetic skin - clanging to the floor. He stares up at my humming weapons, and I glare back with my many - many - eyes. Oops. Hisses every turret. Every camera. Every speaker in the bar - all at once. I missed. Chrome steps forward, as internal valves seal the metal wound. Cold fury eating his former dismay. YEH THINK YEH CAN GANK ME IN ME OWN BAR!? YEH FUGGIN'' [HACKER] FREAK!? He roars at triple the volume a human could reach. SO! WHO ARE YEH!? WHO ARE YA, THAT YE DARE GANK ME!? KING O'' THE KINGS O'' OLDE!? WHO-!? Another massive slug explodes the table beside him. Run. I suggest. And it echoes from every machine. Run. Run. Run. Run. KILL DA TURRETS! Chrome yells even louder - stabbing his good arm at me. And I got no eyes to widen as a literal cannon unfolds from deep inside his massive forearm. And I got no chance of repeating that earlier stunt - I was aiming for his dang ass! A pulse of mind, and I pull the trigger - but too soon. The turrets power-bank was barely cycling up. It dents Chromes chest, and bounces off. Right as the cyborg fires, and my turrets internals explode. Shredding my mind with mad chaos and feedback. But it aint enough. A millisecond after, I open up with every other weapon I have. All four gauss guns at once, aimed square at his chest. Exploding panels and from every direction at once. Chrome falls to one knee - metal spine exposed. Most of his chest just gone. Which is near-as-damn nonlethal on a monster like this. But the bar utterly loses it. Some fire back, charge the door, or join the heck in - cause why not? Others take cover - or open fire at the armoured bar, assuming it''s the owner. Which just happens to put us in the line of fire. I panic. Were really exposed under here. If they see Demon shielding me.. Or the spike in my skull. No time. Dont let em think. "GUESS AGAIN, INSECTS!" I chatter, unleashing pure and total chaos. Firing at tables. At walls. And right through the menu. Whoops. FIND DA [HACKER]! KILL DA GUNS!! Chrome bellows as he struggles up. Cogs and actuators falling loose. Servos groaning in metal agony. A fleshy human would''ve been torn in half by now - but not ole titanium asscheeks over here. He grabs a table, forcing himself toward me. Or, rather, the turrets.. But turrets were just part one. And I got other toys. Stage two - I open the shutters. Blinding the whole bar in the light of the ganger rigs outside, and throwing our spot into shadow. More guns light up. Goons diving for the walls or tables as I help light up the others. Kami, under cover of panic, punting my smokebomb right into the back of the room, where it erupts like an angry cloudbank. Choking the thugs. Obscuring the cameras. Filling the air with its bounty. I flip cameras to heat mode, and I start firing at bloody nothing - like a total maniac. Ripping up the ceiling. Blasting out tables. Pirates and gangs go freaking running. Some out the back, some out the front. Another turret dies - my mind fried with colour and sound. But Ive won. The invasion flipped into a sudden expulsion as all three gangs yeet themselves out - with regulars in tow. Leaving nothing but smoke. And bodies. Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. And Chrome. And us. He punches a turret through the wall - and I do mean through. Turning his broken body to the bar as rage lights his bright metal eyes. Meybe. Meybe I was wrong. Meybe...." He takes a step toward the bar - plus my actual body - and every fibre of my being goes ''oh shit''. "Meybe..." He chuckles again. "Meybe me own barkeep got it out for me. Huh?" He laughs, and it''s almost joyful. Like he worked out the big trick.... A thing of triangles and ticking eyes materialises in cyberspace. "Spook. While I have no issues with you dismantling a murderous gang-leader-" "COME ON DEN! YE WANT ME DED!?" Chrome smashes his gun-fist into his chest, taking another slumping step toward the armoured bar. " WELL DEN!! LETS GO! EH! COME ON! GET YE WORTHLESS MOTHER-FRUKIN ASS OUT HERE AN FIGHT ME!!!" Another step. Fist swiping at smoke. A table smashed aside. Rocket-bullets blasting through the windows - unheeded, and unfelt. "COME ON, LIL BARKEEP!! AFORE I CRUSH YA FLAT IN YA OWN TIN CAN!!! Guess again, metal man. I sing through the staticy speakers - twisting my voice back, closer to normal. Hear that? The song o'' bullets. The Reaper is calling your name..... A kid?? He snaps. [Hacker]s are a right beedin'' bitch, aint they? Could be right behind ya. Could be miles away.... I sneer in relief, modulating it back to keep the doubt on high. Dont want the barman ganked, but I don''t want him zeroing us neither. Better run, little man. I trill as he starts trashing the whole damn world looking for me. My last guns firing randomly, through the smoke. A lucky shot to his hip - and he falls. Still fighting. Still firing. But now hes using cover - acting semi smart. Ish. So I draw him towards the back - and he staggers that way. Its now or never. I screw up all my aim-settings, flip the turrets to auto-target, and- Everything explodes into static as Polybius ynaks my brain right out of the network. Spitting it back into my sweating, jerking, convulsing body under the table- Wait, no, Demon is carrying me? Im outside? Panic hits as smoke and neon darkness whirls around me. Bright signs. Broken lamps. I start to struggle, and he veers off the road, right as I flip clear out of his arms. Landing hard on my. coffee machine? No, wait - my face. Urrrgh. I grab his leg with my autoGuns. Bar had cofffeeeeee. I groan, like this is critical need-to-know information. Hah. Yeah. Used to be a diner, mate. Zip smirks wide, flickering back into being. And now it used to be a bar. Kami drawls as little explosions pop the air. All shapes and smoke shot through by blazing, rainbow, light and beams of dancing halogen. Shadows and shapes whisking past our alley. Trails snapped in the smoke by bullets, bikes, and bastards with guns. Yah. Super. I groan as everything blurs back to together, bit by bit. Grawwww. Did not jack out properly. Kami flicks up all six titanium arms in a shoulderless shrug - which does weird things to her cloak. Got rough. Had to yank it. So? We going or what? Cmon! Ill. gimmie. I groan, trying to remember what legs are for. Bad to be waiting! Demon''s tail flicks, fretfully, as guns flare with fire in the smoke. Bullets bouncing down our dead-end alley. Right. Right. Think Im- Four horns cast a sharp shadow above as he grabs me again. Kah-kah-kah!! The foreign boy snarls in a staccato rush, ripping claws across his impish fox-mask. Ztat des unja- OH SHIIII-!!! Kami screams as a huge wall of floodlights, metal, and great big wheels comes hammering past our alley. Three tons of DIY madness crashing through stalls, lampposts, and onlookers alike. I hear it skid to a stop - and a massive yell goes up. Dozens of crazy punks thumping off the sides to run literal riot. Demon pulls me over his shoulder - jamming horns in bits I''d rather he didn''t. Thankfully, most of it armoured. Before I can yell, everything blurs backwards - hyperspace fast. I fend him off as we explode from the alley, bolting - on all fours - across gritty brick and slick stone. A sky of iron three stories above us - right where rooftops meet the ceiling. Ganger rigs roar with light in the smoke as the others chase. Every shadow a spiky whirl of cubs and chains, rocket guns, DIY shotguns, and even a freaking sword. It''s a blur of madness and monsters and things in the dark. Animal shapes leaping off walls in a mad flurry of claws and teeth. Mutated ''Gone Wrong'' gangers whipping tentacle arms, soaked in eyeballs and stingers. We slink into a row of jetBikes parked along an armoured pirate shopfront. Barricades dropping in layers to seal away illicit prizes. We crouch low, beneath the holo-sign. Hearts banging. Peering beyond the last bike at a world still little more than but dim shapes and colour. A mad dream of violence, with precious little cover. Zip, are we gonna have air support!? Bout a minute, maybe? I got hostiles. What? That far out? I blink. Mate. Its a Pirate Tower and, like- CRAP! Zip yelps and flails. fumbling off an attack I can''t see. .....nevermind. Cmon. I swipe his illusion aside, and catch the wild yellow eye Demon flips at me. "Yeah, m''head''s screwed. You take ''point''." I concede, and he nods. Trailing that slither of tail as he creeps to the end of the row. Beyond it - mayhem. I poke the ass-ornament, and he rushes onward - bounding off a wall, as some clown-masked ganger wangs a bat at him. We chase after. Dodging fists - hurling elbows. A huge shape barrels at us, and I kick off his chest - stumbling him back. Kami nips past, ramming fists in his gut. I bounce to the side, and everything goes hyperspace as I try to kick him in the head. Missing by metrics. He stumbles back, but were already gone. Skirting a burning rig. Two more guys take casual swipes. A metal-faced woman flailing a taser-barbed whip at my face. Demon ducks round me - tanking the damn hit. One arm punches a forearm into hers - knocking the whip away. The other jabs a palm to the face, shoving her off. She hits the wall, and I wind her with a kick. Rolling to duck her boyfriend - and throwing myself to freedom. Were halfway off into the mist before the tires scream again. Headlights chasing over the bomb-proof armoured grills they call windows. We duck at the pop-pop-pop of rocket guns. But nothing to do with us, so we freakin leg it. Kami a thundering avalanche of hobnails, well behind our whispering pads. We skid into a stop - waiting for her to catch us at the corner. She flicks my fuzzy ear as she passes, and I yelp. Chasing her in a toothy fury as Demons metallic claws clash sparks off the bends. Tails snapping the air. A shout, far behind, and a massive BANG rocks the air. Like a pimped-up ganger rig smashing its way through jetBikes. Welded armour screeching. Some punk yells an overly-complicated warcry, and- Boom-bada-boom! The bombs begin to shout. Rocking the world behind us. Buildings and signs streaking around us in a whirl of sight, and sound and smell. Hideouts, Laboratories, Dens, Shops, and disassembled airShips blending together into a hyperspace corridor of light. Ripping open the night to reveal the glory of the Pirate Enclave - our little refuge far from the eyes of the Corp, and the law. And whoever else might be looking.... > > >< < < >> Brink >> Brink A few blocks down, and were still a blur - so fast we barely touch the floor. My lungs pump in powerful rhythm. The greasy scent of deep-fried simFood wafting on the wind. I laugh, and bound free. Giddy and riding the rush of the fight. Getting back into my stride, with every second. Pirates leaping out of the way. Kami a furious little voice, far behind. Nothing but the growing crowds to dodge as I follow the ceiling that hangs, low, above the buildings. A green arrow spins into existence ahead of me as Zipper marks us a path. But I ignore it. Too caught in the rush of the run. The pounding of rough brick beneath palms and soles. I skid on a corner, and then on another. A catch the scent of chocolate buns, and wafting rain. The signs above shifting from purple, to red, to green, to- I turn a corner, and the world just ends. The road. The ceiling. The buildings. The ground itself, terminating in a massive, three-story, wall of windows - blown out into absolute nothingness. Into darkness. Into pounding rain, and hurricane winds. Ships pour in, overhead. Roaring with thunder, and dripping with oil. So loud. So very, very, loud. Sudden panic and chaos slamming through my head as I grind to a shredding halt. Panting. Gasping. Wide-eyed, and shaken. Battered back by the storm and chaos blasting in from that massive, gaping, void where the megaTower itself.... just.... ENDS. Brutally. Instantly. As if cut off by a laser. It''s the outside. The outside of the massive hollow Arcology in which the Pirates built their home. And I still my breath upon the edge. Mind locked suddenly tight. Staring out of that broken window at a sudden vison of massive - battered - megaTowers rising from the howling dark. Ringed, and pierced, by gleaming loops of silver-steel track that shriek and spark with speeding trains. Haunted by ancient, time-burnt, holos that stutter and jitter in the storm. A dozen Pirate enclaves - so massive that every floor is filled with smaller buildings. With scenes of light and life so close I could reach out and touch them.... Even as I fell. White noise, and chaos rising in my head as a swell of wind roars up under my belly. Calling me to fly. To tip down, and down, and down - into the belly of the night..... And some part of me does. A shadow. A ghost. A might-have-been that kept on running. Skidding. Panicking. Only to tumble, over the edge. Down, down, down a sheer ramp of glass - into the tumbling depths. Snapping bones, and shattering- "Hey, idiot. The world''s up here." Kamis eyes are wicked as she hauls me vertical. Dangling me about like a limp puppet. So.... What now. leader? We still doing pal-phone-bees? "Calzone, mate." Zip groans, fully aware she''s doing it deliberately. "Cal what?" She smirks, dangling me about. Prodding my face with multiple fingers on multiple hands. "Hey? Hey? I think Spook is broken." "Right..." I mutter, eyes stuck on that hole. "Spook? Mate? Hey, you okay?" Zip tilts his head at me, like a GMO. Flicking his eyes toward that vast, all consuming- "Yeah." I groan. Gripping my helmet. Tail lashing, oily, and embarrassingly fluffed behind me. "Liquid cheese. Sounds good." "You know it, mate! You''re gonna love this place!" Zip whoops - pulling up menus and maps like he''s planning a food-themed war. Kami smirks a nod, eyes flitting between me and the inky- My whole body jerks as a needle-sharp speeder slices in from the dark. Thrust-compactors thrumming and thumping as it turns to park itself on the roof of a nearby garage. I take a shivery breath, and shake it off. It wasn''t a trap. It wasn''t. I just got careless, and... The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. "Mate, hey, you sure you''re okay?" "Fine. Fine." "It''s not, like, the heights thing again-" Skidding. Falling. Flailing for whatever purchase I can get. Claws scratching, groping, reaching - feeble as a dream. As if the world just stopped being real. Oil and grease filling my nails. Unsettling my delicate balance. Right until- "I''m good." I grin with feeble cheer. "So. That. Uh? Burger thing?" "Calzone!!! Mate! Come on!" He bends almost backwards, groaning into his hands. "Like, it ain''t even similar!" "Both got melty cheese innit." I smirk, with my tongue out. "And simMeat... simVeg." "Lotta sauces too." Kami''s grim lips twitch. Cold eyes twinkling, just a little. "And, like-" "You two are killing me, y''know?" Zip grumbles, with a dead-eyes look of suffering. Demon chuckling, quietly, behind his mask in that reserved little way of his. The kind where he''s sorta here, and he''s sorta with us, but he doesn''t quite join in.... I loosen up as we pad (in Kami''s case, clomp) through the endless Pirate bazar. Past hundreds of chop-shops, burger-bars, wreckers, mechanics, and half-built ships leaking oil all over the place. Gleaming Pirate choppers rumbling, throatily, as Pirate kids scurry back and forth. Stealing whatever they can. A reminder that nothing in Karrak is ever as safe as it seems. Even out here, in the markets, where casual tourists get to keep nearly all of their kidneys. If not their wallets. It''s a beautiful place, in a weird - wonky - kind of way. Pirate prizes streaking in over our heads to line up in auctions, or drop off at buyers. Sellers with too many arms sizzling "fresh-caught" monsterMeat, right off the QIZ. Guaranteed ''no mutagens'', or your money back. Though, probably not your nose. We even pass a massive, armoured, humanoid figure - with a built-in cockpit. Thirty feet tall, and ribbed with red stripes. Its visor bright with gold. Its jet-systems wide open - leaking cables like spaghetti. "Damn. That''s an Aristo-class mek, mate." Zip whistles up at it, yelping as I cast my gaze down. "Hey, like, keep looking. I want to see this-" "Nope." Kami chuckles, focused on the pair of slightly-mutated Pirates waging a slap-fight at its metal feet. Something, something, you-put-the-bloody-engines-in-backwards-you-idiot.... by the sound of it. I shake my head. Just admiring the ever-present weirdness of Karrak, as Zip giddily tells us everything anyone has ever known about that mek. Half of which I''m pretty sure he''s just making up on the bleedin'' spot. But I don''t care. Onward we go at the same slow pace. The street widening out into a market square full of junk-shops and pretzel venders. Our virtual guide pointing out weaponised drones and speeders. Jury-rigged fighters, built from former civilian ships. Rusty old salvage-ships, which barely cling to actual flight by their fingernails. Often with way too-many, terrifyingly casual, pirate kids clung to loops of dubious cargo-rope netted across the sides. "Oh, look at that." Kami announces, sorta awkwardly, as we pass by a long row of shops with thickly barred windows. All racks of engine-parts, and jetBikes in various states of ''not riding that''. Which ain''t exactly unusual in Pirate Town. Except.... We stop in front of a thick metal grill that pulses with weak greenish light. The window behind it different - and strange. All velvet drapes, and little pillows. Each boasting a few, glowing, fragments of originTek that gleam beneath the thick glass. Whispering secrets of the ancient past. Of knowledge lost to humanity. There''s more across the square. All kinds of dubious little shops slapped right in there, willy-nilly, between the wrecker-shops and discount noodle bars. All filled to bursting with esoteric, almost-magical, devices. Orbs, and cubes, of blackest stone - cut with colourful glyph-like circuits, that pulse and hum with ominous light. Some laid, potent and strange, upon velvety cushions. Others hanging low in the air, as if stuck there. Or orbiting, gently, above tapered square pillars. Y''know. The kind that come to a sharp point. Like an obelisk. "Mission complete, yeah?" Zip snickers. "Yeah." I laugh, weakly. Shaking my head. "Weird-ass place for a fake magic shop." Kami snorts at the GMO fox-man smoking it up at the open-air Raman-bar beside it, tail-brush swishing as he taps at screens only he can see. "It''s Karrak, baby." Zip smirks. "Karrak, my ass. I''m gettin'' hungry here." I groan, eyeing the menu. Hey! Whao! Calzones, mate! Remember? Way better than soggy noodles. Zippers avatar insists, teleporting sideways to block out the bar. Plus, like, I sorta havent scoped that one- He cringes. "-y''know?" Right, right. I fend him off. Youll get ya greasy pizza-goo-sandwich thing. Kami shrugs. All comes from the same nutriSlop bag. We hope. I remind her. Right. Anyway. Zip - where''s this inside-out food thing?" His smirk lights up. Hah, thatd be- His avatar freezes, suddenly, in mid-motion. Jittering strangely. Stuck, silent, right in mid air. Zip? Kami folds arms. Are you pissing about? But the image shudders. Glitching. Twitching. And then it vanishes - leaving only a No Signal bar. An instant later, two of Zips tiny spy-drones smack into pavement. > > >< < < >> Trouble >> Trouble My insides go cold as the tiny drones fizzle. "Zip...." I turn on the spot. Taking in the crowds. The mad chaos. The ships over head. "What the Hell...." I breathe. "He''s just.... Just gone.... Hey! Zip! Polybius....? You guys alright?" What the heck is happening over there? "Calling Overwatch. Come in, Overwatch...." Kami taps her gauntlet, under the cloak. Her eyes widening. "Shit. He better not be bloody screwing with us....." "No. He bloody loves those drones." I growl. "Hed never smash em for a prank. Which means...." We both feel it. The tang in the air. The shiver up the spine. Somethings going on. My eyes narrow as we glance around. Trying for casual. We got the two guys still arguing over that broken mek robot. A kid trying to nick our drones, even as Demon fends em off. And. That fox... ....that fox at the Ramen Bar..... .....is staring at us. Left heel hooked up on his stool. Claws tapping counter. Tail swishing. I swallow, not letting my eyes fix on him - but noting the other Pirates nearby. The armoured stalls, loaded with ''fresh'' booster parts. The jacked up bouncers watching the mek. Cyborgs, GMOs, and Gone Wrongs with cockroach bodies and too many legs.... Any could be an ambush. Any- Snap. One instant, the square is bright with rigs and lamps and blazing signs that paint the night. The next? Everything flickers, and the whole thing goes dark. I jump as a sign goes bang! Erupting in a massive fountain of sparks that rush and skitter. Holos go dead. Neon LEDs stuttering to nothing as DIY junction boxes self-destruct in spectacular style. Every machine. Every bike. Every light. Everything that ain''t shielded or attached to us dying with the force of some unseen attack. Ships and jetBikes juttering in mid-air as power fails - dropping em onto buildings, burger-carts, and each-other. Barely slowed by the dregs of emergency power, as everything goes dark. Leaving only the faint glow of originTek, colouring the windows. Before the first spark hits the ground, I''m in behind a parked truck that''s dying where it stands. Demon flickers off to the side. Kami ripping away her cloak - glassy eyes, with golden hearts, glimmering against blue-black armour. Slick against her skin. Ripping pistol after pistol from her belt and bandoleer. As the final light dies, my implants slowly stop jittering. Bionic eyes clicking as they adjust to the dark. Beside me, The GMO fox slips off his stool - into a liquid crouch over clawed feet. Sniffing the air. Tail flicking. Is he the ambush.? We lock eyes - and his flicker. Bright with vivid orange light. My hand slips behind me - bladed fingers tightening on the thing thats been butting my back all night. For a second, were still. Me and Mr Fox. Staring each-other down. Him crouched - head tilted, ears sharp. Me, much the same. And then the guy blurs, and so do I. Hardened plastic gleaming as I swing up the modified SMG into play - quad barrels, ready to rock. Ready to shred. Hes in mid-air when the tiny threads of wiring activate in my palm - connecting the gun to my implant. Instantly, an ammo readout unfolds in mid-air. Virtual crosshairs swinging across the street, targeting- The guy grabs the shutters of his noodle bar with brassy red claws, and hammers them down. Locking off the darkened shop. Like thats the cue - every other Pirate slams their doors, bolts shutters, or scrams. Shutting us out in the dark. Mere seconds later, were all alone on the rain-streaked street - with even the eternal hum of the Citys machines shut off. Rain. That''s all I hear. Rain, and wind, and the beating of my heart. My breath. And Demon - a low, predatory, shape prowling across the square. If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. My ears flick flat back against my helmet, and I turn a circle. Tail bristled. Pulse racing as I feel the shadows begin to slither and churn in every alley.. Imagination? Madness? A whisper of movement behind me, and I swing at empty air. Its me, you fuzzy idiot. Kami hisses as invisible hands knock aside my gun. Didnt you hear my comms? Shit, no. I growl. Cant see ya, neither. I tap my implant. "Shit! You ain''t showin'' up. Comms are dead. Everyone''s offline..... Even Pol." Not that the Machine Mind would do us much good.... Air warps as light itself unbends, and Kamis image erupts from nothing. For a split second, golden rings of light orbit the strange eyes embedded in her armour - and then they burst. Flickering dark. Or hear me. She hisses, gaunt-faced and grinning. Not even when I was right bloody behind you. Yeah, I did. Hence the turn. I smirk, but it doesnt last. Not with our signals blocked. Not as the winds roar up behind us, funnelled by the shops. Hemming me in to the back of that van - which doesnt feel safe at all. Kamis stealth-cells burn bright gold - rupturing into dots of brilliance that blur into rings. She vanishes, suddenly - shrinking to a vertical line, and winking out. But no signal means no handy blue outline to mark her out. No dots on the map for my team. I feel very alone. And, from every corner, the shadows push inward, real or not. Boiling across the square. Pouring toward the centre. And me. Stealth-field. Gotta be. Or is it? I back away fast. Nanotek cloud or or originTek? Or monster spores.? Whatever it is, I aint dying to find out. So as its pouring together, I slip my way out. Edging for one of the less-dark alleys, and poking my gun round the corner to see by its inbuilt camera. But the dark rises. Shining, and evil, and almost happy to see me. Writhing and gnashing its teeth with glee. Claw meets trigger, and my gun explodes with fury. With daggers of flame that roar from vents along the sides of the barrel. Spitting out swarms of rocket-powered death that whistle and shriek down the alley. The bullets are tiny. Only 22 calibre. But they arrive as a freaking wall - smashing the bins apart. Crates rupture or crack. Brick flayed from walls as the doors at the end dent inward - tiny craters blooming in their surface. In 2.75 seconds, I hose the entire alley from side to side. Dumping twenty bullets per second, per barrel. The ticker slamming from 220 to absolute zero in three panicked breaths, or less. The magazine clicks, shunting outward - then dropping. I slam in a second, and the gears grab it. Locking all four outputs to the staggered intakes of the gun. And silence. Shadowed fronds of Dark twist through twisted trails of smoke. The stink of burnt propellent heavy on the air. Thick as silk. Rocket-holes sizzling as they sputter out. Suspicious - I grab the breather from my belt, and shove it on. Locking it in place, under my visor. Now all I smell is rubber. I take a slight step on my pad - claws ticking brick. So loud in the sudden silence. I step again. Slick light gleaming on slick armour as I hunt for my foe - trusting Kami to stick on m back. Nothing moves. Nothing but dark. I lick my fangs, tasting the breather. A hesitant moment, and I slot a second - fat - stick of bullets onto the butt of the first. It locks in place, with a whir - doubling my ammo count to 440. Makes my aim a little heavy, but first thing I see is getting- The dark wells, and I blur backward. But a foul and slippery laugh twists up on the wind. A laugh I remember - barking and harsh. From before we escaped. A laugh that ends lives. A laugh that haunted my dreams, on a cold concrete floor. In a ''bed'' marked out by thick painted lines.. You. I hiss. And a thing of darkness, cut from neon shadow, rises across the shuttered grill of a shop. Deathly tall. Spindly as bone. Eerily familiar - but utterly faceless. Just a grin like a circular saw, as it whispers back into nothingness. I run. But the monster - the memory - is everywhere, and ever-laughing. In every window. Under every door. Hideously tall, and wickedly thin in that long brown coat - bloodied inside, and shot full of holes. A snap of long fingers, and Kami flashes back into sight. Haunted in eye, and stilling of heart. My mind flicking back. Right back. Right to girl who hides her face with too many hands.... Together, we back down the street. "Which way?" She breathes. "Back-?" My mind flashes with images of falling. "No." "Forward? Toward the core?" We turn that way - but, somehow, the monster is there as well. Propped against a lamppost. Smoke spilling from every fold of that leather-lined coat. Long fingers click, and the light flickers on. Dim, and yellow. Illuminating nothing. But it carves that figure deeper into the world, as if every second burns a hole through reality. Into the void. Into endless, primordial, unbreakable ink. Deeper than any dark around it..... It bows, swooping a shadow of a feathered hat from its head head. Wide brimmed, Gothic. Set with a flare of tiny brass roses - transfixing a skull. Like some prop from a carnival of the dead. There is no face beneath it. No head. Demon leaps high and fast - from nowhere at all. Blond hair flying free of his hood to whip and snap in the wind. Golden claws glimmering - little points of light on hands and toes. He strikes with all at once. A snarl saws his throat, like chains crushing bone. And I scream - silently, and deep inside - because I know. It''s a suicide mission. He''s throwing himself forward in the hope we escape. But The Nightmare is gone, just as quick. Just dark on the wind, and laughter. Raw, and wild.... "What the Hell is going on!?" I hiss as Demon lands in a feral crouch beside us - guttural and furious. That kitsune mask flicking around - and up - as he hunts for a target. I step toward the Hub, and there it is. So casual. So sudden. So thin it''s unreal. Just stood in our way, gloves in pockets, like it''s waiting.... Demon steps forward - less certain. But Kami grabs him, and drags him away. But that wide brim tilts toward us, and from the depths of ink beneath.... slips a grin like a circular saw. A smile built of knives. Literal knives. Splitting the right side of that eyeless nothingness it calls a face - far too wide to be real. Then, out of the other. Floating up, like corpses from water. Comes a darkly burnished gleam. A shining crescent of silver skull that locks to the left side of its face - like the stolen death-mask of a storybook moon. Grinning with cold, black, amusement. Well, hello again, boys and girls.. It whispers in a voice of sweetened, silky, poison. Demon grabs my arm in a maddened panic, dragging me into a run. Hurling me directly toward that hideous - gaping - maw in the side of the megaTower. That hole were all the ships come in. The brink. >>><<< >> The Dark Behind The Dark >> The Dark Behind The Dark
## [Omega Team: Zero] battleLink connection has failed due to [unknown interference]. ## WARNING: Blocking or obstructing official neoSoviet signals is an act of terrorism! ## New Orders: Eradicate local traitors and counter-revolutionaries. ## Glory to The Leaders! Glory to the Revolution!
Waves of brutal rain slam me into walls and doors. Shoving me into buildings, then sucking me back. I scream, and claw, as Demon grabs me again - dragging me along the road ringing the edge of the megaTower. Pushing me on, and on. Directly along the edge of that howling maw, where once were windows and weather displays. The protection long gone - salvaged or shot out. Now gappy, and broken, like old man''s teeth. The still-covered parts are almost worse than the open ones - forming tunnels of wind that hit like a hammer to the face. Blasting us down the cliff-top street. The shops all weathered and wrought with rust. The storm, tonight, is massive. It never ends. It never breaks. But it swells, and ebbs, and roars - and today it rises to consume the whole world with fury. Transforming bullet-hard rain into a sheer, blinding, tsunami that scrubs away everything beneath it. And its only getting worse. And.... behind us.... Shadows pour up to flood the brick in a living liquid - venomous, and slithering. A Dark deeper than anything out there, in the inky-black storm. A Dark that devours everything electronic - every sign, every shutter and defence - in a vast roar of sparks. Blowing out colourful frontages, lights, parked ships, and airBikes. Erasing the light and life of the tower, and reclaiming it all for the Eternal Black that drapes our midnight world. And so we run. and run. Battered across the slick red-lit brick by the driving roar of The Eternal Storm. Wind catching me again, and again, as we stumble past more missing glass. Empty depths whispering, whispering, beneath. Beckining me toward them... Into their embrace. ''If you fall'', they seem to promise, ''the Nightmare Thing won''t get you''.... "No.... No.... I won''t. I can''t....." A Korean bar, ahead, tucked away in a glass-shielded section. Glowing with life and promise. With people. I stutter toward it, ready to bolt inside - but Kami catches my other arm. Locking me rigid with hateful touch. "Dead end!!" She screams, grim duty etched into her pinched face as she pushes me forward. Carrying my screaming - panicking - body. "NO! NO!" I bite at her on reflex, but she''s all armour. All metal. There''s no flesh to be had. Behind us, the bar-sign explodes in a torrent of sparks and cruel laughter - all its song shut off. My heart thudding, wildly, as something formless and inky is outlined by billowing motes of light, soon quenched by The Storm. A thing with a metal-toothed smile, trailing a coat full of holes.... "Little children.... boys and girls....." I hurl myself faster. Shutting the eye closest to The Maw, and turning my head away. Storm-waters crashing across my hands. Licking my nose, my ankles, my fingers and feet. Flecking my skin with sharp little kisses. Hurricane winds lashing my tail into a streamer as we''re hurled one way - then slam my cheeks with the force of a slap. Smacking it down beneath the wet flag of my cloak. And all the while, The Shadows rise. Boiling up from that endless Hell of tumbling dark beyond the broken windows. Transmuting its empty void into a well of sharpened teeth, fit to drink the soul right out of you. The world ahead is bright, vibrant, packed with life. But every second, like a bad dream, that line of neon light flees further from our feet. Every micron closer, sees another section fail. Whole sections dying, as if washed away by the rain. I grab Demons arm, jabbing a claw down a narrow - twisted - alley. A ruby mile of red-hot sin. Of metal limbs, and raw flesh. Of come-hither tentacles, and. Dead eyed smilers. Whatever your numb heart desires. For a price. But at least its shelter, right? Demon wrenches me back from the alley-mouth with terror in his eyes, and I almost feel the jaws snap behind me. Like I danced on the gaping maw of a monster, worse than the one behind us..... And then, it goes dead, too. So we run. But it doesnt help. Not at the next turn, or the one after - lights blackening before us. Turning all to ink and shadow and fleeing shapes. On the fourth, I cant take it any more - Ive gotta get away from that sick edge, or Ill die. I drag at their grip, tearing free of Kami. She screams at me as Demon resists - strong as Hell, but- But Im way more afraid than he is. And I drag him into the gap. Plunging away from the storm. And into. Silence. A dead street. All gaping doors and fallen floors. Half-dead holos glitching and twitching above ransacked shops. Without neon, the whole road sits like a dark spot on your vision. A blind hole. Lit on the edges, but not here. Prime ganger ambush spot, lemme tell you. But there''s no sudden plunge, and that''s all I bloody care about. We bolt inside. And the shadow-things rise. Eating our exit, and boiling round us. A thousand broken masks. A billion inky threads. They rise and twist into The Nightmare we thought wed escaped. That coat of holes and blood flickering behind it, like a flag. Strange, how you keep running away. when I''m just trying to help. Whispers the moon-faced dark. That''s not very nice, is it? Thats not very friendly.. Its not what Good Children do. It scolds as plumes of jagged Darkness surround us. Cutting off our escape. And now I know. It wasn''t hunting us. It was herding us into the narrows. In an instant, we scatter and ready to fight. Kamis boots thump left as she vanishes - Demon''s pads whispering right. He leaps atop the crooked tip of a streetlamp, in a clash of claws and flicking wet tail. Hunkering there - a scared predator, but dangerous. All golden eyes, burning with pitiless death, as a low growl thrums the cool air with primordial pressure. Go. away.. I manage, alone in the middle. Barely louder than a breath. A choke. A rasp. But the monster is upon us - a thousand broken masks weaving from nothing and darkness. Filling the shadows with teeth. But. arent you pleased to see me again.. dear children? The figure whispers as it slithers closer. No happy little hugs? No warm and friendly cheers? No- Instantly, its close. Too close. -thing at all? Not.... not even a nice little.... Smile.? The grin spikes wider than the face. Long fingers - soaked to the elbow in kid-skin glove - drifting beneath my nose. I stop breathing. Tilting my chin away. My. My. If only Mummy and Daddy could see you sulk." That Hellish creature purrs as it swirls around me. "Why.... theyd turn that frown upside-down.... so fast youd scream.. An evil little smile. "....with joy....." "We''re not going back!" Kami screams. "Not for you, or anyone!" My fists clench claws into my palms. Fury burning as the psycho chuckles at its own little ''joke''. We all know what it really means. We know.... And.... "Yeah. We''re done. With you. With all ya shitty little games." I whisper as memories flicker. Images burnt into my very bones by this nightmare creature. This AI, or.... whatever it is.... "We''re bloody done." "And here I was, about to indulge all your sweetest hopes and dreams...." Breathes the moon-masked monster. Cajoling, and sorrowful, and twisting with glee. Like I broke the heart it never had, and it enjoyed it. "To offer you the world.... in fact.... And solve all your little problems.... " I falter. Backing away. "Problems....?" I hiss. "What?" I jerk back as Kami snaps a questioning look at me. A yellow eye swivels up from inside an empty socket. "Well.... You are Running Away, after all.... But what are you running from? Your lovely parents, perhaps....?" It leans in as a sick roar of fear curdles my belly. Evil memories crawling their fingers up my spine. "And their quaint little School?" My head snaps away. Whip-fast. Panting. "Shut up. They''ll never get us- They''re not going to-" "No? You''ll make your poor Mummy cry her eyes out, night after night? Just wishing her poor little poppets would scurry back home.....?" A throaty murmur of laughter in the hollow void above. "Do you think you can can just.... tuck yourself away behind the curtains? That you can hide from all their Teachers.... and their Toys..... Their Puppets, and their Good Little Boys and Girls...." Moon bends right down to my ear, like nothing alive. "...and ME." It breathes. "When they send me to get you..... And I''m the nice one, remember....?" You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version. Monsters. Nightmares. Creatures so vile- Things I can''t tell you. Not yet. It''s just too- "Ready or not....." It pushes closer. "Here we come....." "Stop it." I whisper, through all the madness and the images and- "Or maybe.... you''ve got that all in hand?" It barks its raw chuckle, sweeping away. "What do I know, after all? Maybe it''s all fun and games in your little pillow fort..... But oh.... What''s this? Are you having a little trouble feeding all those hungry mouths...? Perhaps a little issue spinning clients into money.....?" It twists its heads lasciviously. "Oh my! Your shocked little faces! And what is the count now? Five little frowny-face rejections? In two little weeks? Oh yes.... That''s right.... But I can help with that too....." The eyes almost twinkle. "I can spin anything.... into anything....." "You....." My eyes snap to its face, latching on to the one thing I can deal with. "You were watching. At the bar....." "And.... so many other places...." "It has to be lying." Kami stutters out my thoughts. "We post adverts. It''s all in public. This... thing... just has good intel. That''s it.... That has to be it....." But I''ve got bigger questions. How....? And how are you here.?" I hiss at in in bristling terror. Forcing the words out. "You bloody said. You said. That Im trapped? Chained? Locked away in Mummy''s basement? More of the Moon-Monsters faces slither from existence behind me. Silly little thing. Silly little munchkin! It thinks the shadow of the chair is the monster in the hall. Gloats the monster before us. And then, like a guillotine snap that saw-tooth smile is gone. That mirror-slice of skull twisted toward me. Oh yes. I am trapped and contained. All bound up in chains - too tight to even enjoy it..... But I''ve yet to be broken to the lash by your loving Mummy and your, tender, Papa.. The sneer twists back onto its face, like a crack through black glass. And I do have my little ways.. Yes.. My pretty little ways. They aint- I snarl through gritted teeth. -our bloody parents. And the thing touches its half-broke chin - as if considering. Oh? Are you sure? The vicious head tilts - like a snapped neck - and theres the, giddy, demonic side of the mask. With teeth like smiling swords. Why.. But then theres an opening at the top. And I do so love playing.... Mummies And Daddies. Oh PISS OFF! Our [Sniper] screeches in mad, wild, terror from the shadows behind. PISS ON THEM TOO! Piss on your whole- Kami! I snap. Shut it! Too late. The figure snaps into existence behind our unseen [Sniper] - or where she must be. Dreadful and awful and horrifically tall. Like a broken memory of an adult, from when you were little. My, my. Arent you a treat.? Arent you a grateful little child, all stacked full of sweet little praises and joy.? And after all I''ve done for you.... It mocks her, so tenderly. So cold and viciously amused. And I know I gotta get its attention back. What delightful, delectable, delicious little things. And still nothing nice to say to me? Your saviour.? The one who set you free from that charming School you hate so much..? Who so generously offers you all the.... help.... you could ever desire? Why, I might even have a way to- Piss off? I hazard, and the head spins my way. Like theres a spring in it. Taking the bait. Yeah. You heard.. YOU HEARD! Oh. I heard indeed.. Dangling arms scrape the floor as it drifts my way. Eyes like razors, slicing deep into my veins. Right to the heart of me. Yeah? And whatcha gonna do? I batter on in pure bravado. Youre trapped. You said so. You aint even here! Not really! I step back as it steps forward. Youre just.... some nanoTek swarm playin at being the devil. The head tilts more, and my voice starts to tremble. The thing is just staring at me. Or. Some kinda.... holo.... The eyes never waver. ...a virus in our implants. Or. Or . Or.? Moon implies. Letting that one word hang, in silence, like a corpse from a rope. Dangling. Festering. Sickening my soul with unholy eyes that dig, dig, dig into my mind..... We dont gotta listen to you! Not any more! I force myself onward - and its the hardest thing Ive ever said. Direct to the face of The Nightmare that drags children away - into the toothy dark.. We aint. your.. little puppets no more. So go on- I choke as Moon, slides away from Kami. Leaving a shadowy copy of itself behind. Go.. Go? It says, very simply. You want me to go? I barely heave the breath to whisper it. Yeah.. Moons laugh echoes, like a baying demon. Raw, and heavy. and wrong. Oh no.! Are you going to point your little toy guns at me, and yell bang bang BANG!? It croons in malicious delight. Why, what fun! But aren''t you going to tell your little friends why Im really here? And what my help really means? The smile grows ever wider. That Hellish bent of fear and guilt twisting hooks in my guts. Oh? Look at that! Those Sweet little faces! I see you didn''t tell them about.... our.... Deal.. Silence freezes us, then fractures in an instant. You. Kami hisses, barely louder than breath. Head twisting toward me. You. made a DEAL with. that!? You said they were bloody lying! You said there wasnt a deal! "I didn''t make no deal." I growl. Lip drawn back. Ears and tail tight, flat, to my body. Kami takes a step. Then why!? Why is that thing here!? What did you offer it!? NOTHING!! I snarl. But the creature''s chuckle is worse than its laugh - a twisting, evil, little thing that picks at the cracks in your skull. Jabbing knives directly into the soft, tender, meat of your brain. Tell me. Go on. Kami rages. I want to hear this. But cant you guess? The Moon-faced monster whispers, a breath from all our ears at once. Cant you work it all out? My clever little children? Did you really think that you escaped.... from Mummy''s Extra Special Little School.... all on your own.? Treacherous memories snap through my mind - and for an instant, I''m back there. Colours. Nightmares. Toys too big to be real. All crowding in, with- I let out a low growl. We did. Did we? I feel Kamis doubt. And there''s always doubt. You don''t go through.... that.... without..... Without wondering if you really got out.... or its all just a trick..... Or your mind didn''t snap from- No, You did not. Moon salivates over our discomfort. Inhaling it like fine perfume. And the truth is your fuzzy little friend, here, knew it all along. Even before that feeble little ''escape plan''." It flicks me a gesture, gloved in real leather. "Yes. And that''s why it came begging to my door with those big wet eyes. Snotty and sniffling. And ready to do." It licks at hidious lips. "absolutely anything..... I didnt- .and how could I, your caring teacher, ever say no to such a pathetic display..? Not if we could..." It turns a knowing eye to me. "....help each-other out.. as they say. "I bloody wouldn''t-" Thousands of creeping fingers rise from my shaking shadow, formless and legion. Cutting off my cries as I''m forced to leap onto the roof of a car. But still they come. Crawling, ever so slowly, up the sides.... And so.. here you are." The thing whispers, tall as Hell behind me. "Out, indeed. Luxuriating in the very freedom denied to me. Isn''t that Nice.....? The smile grows wider. Darker. Vicious, and dripping with malice. "Of course..... there are a few other little details to our Deal.. But Im sure you arent interested in those. My lips go dry, right down to the bone. Kami shoots me a hard look - half terror, half question. But when she speaks, it''s all business. Details? Yes... A little something for you, and a little something for me...... It sighs, so gently, as nightmare fingers wrap around the roof of my car. Denting the metal. Crawling like- Oh, what did I ask for.? Why, I hardly even remember." Eyes of every shadow flick to me, in silent expectation. Mutated tongues probing metal teeth. "Go on. Tell the class....." I pull myself tighter into a huddle as the ruined car begins to crack and buck. Forcing out a sharp-toothed snarl. V-vengeance. And freedom. Better not mention the other bits. Kami has eyes only for me.. Yes.. Sweetness. Very good. Freedom..... and blood." It exults. "But so much more. And what was that....?" "A partnership." I hiss. "Y''wanted us to.... run jobs for you." "Indeed. Indeed, class. With me you could do more than run. You could fight. You could KILL. You could bathe in money.... and live out your dreams..... Moon swirls its spidery hands around my head as other things crawl, and stroke, and tickle their way toward me..... Don''t you see? Our current goals align.... more than youd like.. I roll and leap off the car - onto the roof of a second. Panting with terror. Wincing back as the one behind me is crushed into a nasty, jagged, ball. "Then... then ya kill us, right? I hiss, very softly. The Dark already flowing. Reaching up for me, like tender little- When theres nothin left to wring out? If ya don''t just send on some bloody lie of a suicide mission. A slow flicker of wry amusement twitches that Evil mouth. You think I cant be grateful to my saviours..?" The nightmare murmurs as it backs me closer, and closer, to that stormy edge. "Why would I kill you if I had everything I wanted....? Grateful.. I hiss with mad bravado. You sick piece of shit. you killed our bloody friends for fun. Then laughed in our faces. And you- You- My voice chokes off. Oh? But you cant hold all that against me. The vile darkness scorns. Tenderly. Its not my fault children are so wonderfully.. It snaps all its twisted fingers. flammable. You. I repeat. You.. Had a lovely time? Shadows of Moon peel away from its bloody red coat. Melting into a ring of figures that rise around us. Why, yes I did. Echoes of itself crowding in. Crowding closer. It was fun, kiddy. You should try having fun some time. You might enjoy it. You absolute psycho fu- I choke. Very much so. The thing whispers, with withering glee. But, luckily for all of us, I dont need you to like me. My precious little bestie. All I need you to do is abide by the terms of our Deal. My tail twists in white-hot rage. Claws splayed, ready to strike. But at what? I need a plan. A way to screw this bastard.... A way to turn everything it has created against it, in a singe - lethal - instant. It wants to trap us? Make us do it''s dirty work, then kill us.... Well..... What if..... What if we used its plan against it.....? Moon''s vile yellow eyes drift, directly, to an empty spot of air. Is that where Kami is? And. As I told your easily-terrified leader..... Theres even a little something on top. for all the continued assistance you may provide.. Just my little way of.... sweetening things up.... Of showing my good side.... I almost feel her eyes narrow. Like what? The nanoTek AI, or whatever it is, goes very very still. As if suddenly wary. Glancing around. Peering at walls, as if they might be listening. Oh. Favours and trinkets, my scrumptious beauty.. It beams her a grin full of twisted mischief. Shadows of itself boiling through the rubble. Scratching and clawing and slithering about. Favours and trinkets. Like. What? She repeats, but a lot less certain. The head tilts. Very well." Razor teeth twist in tightening lips. "I suppose I''ll have to show you, then.... And that itself....." The thing''s eyes shift to the edges. To the rain. To the buildings around us. Like it sees right through them. "Well. That often draws eyes, my pretty little things.... Eyes you should hope to avoid." It seems to think for, for half a moment. "Very well. But don''t you think that I won''t take back what it will cost to hide this..... "Hide what from-" Is as far as Kami gets. Long fingers snap, and shadow explodes from Moon''s coat - wiping the street from existence. Plunging us into a world of roaring Dark, without direction or logic. All is silence and whispers. Shadows and flickers of movement. And then.... eerie grey wallpaper slithers up from the ink. Smoke and ash pouring into shapes. Into ornate brass lamps, and vases, shaped like piles of screaming corpses with tiny ruby eyes. Into vicious paintings, streaming with blood. Every object raging with hideous meanings and foul intent. Like a gallery ripped from Hell itself. "Now...." It whispers. "Let me show you that world I promised you....." > > >< < < >> Beautiful Bait >> Beautiful Bait
## ERROR :: Location [Unknown] ## This area cannot be mapped. ## Attempting to recalibrate.....
Madness blurs around us in a waking nightmare. Grand grey walls rising from nothing to tower, endlessly, up into utterly nothing. Layer upon layer. Staircases and balconies strung without reason or sense. Morbid plinths jutting from every surface, as if space itself is twisted. Feels like a dream. Or a memory.... And, like a dream - every blink, every glance, every movement of my head shifts the art and the walls. Images flickering. Morphing from one into the other. One moment, a disturbing, torturous, mess - like a madman''s scribble. Then a lady with a scratched off face in a blue silk dress..... A tweedy man, with a rigid stare - all melted dogs and mangled monsters dripping from his legs.... A tortured young angel, with a thousand hands of boiling tar ripping at his endless golden wings.... They''re everywhere.... But still I feel the touch of grit and bump of brick beneath my soles. The wind of the cliff. The waft of fried food, beer, and rust. All of it undercut by the endless, thrumming, rumble of Demons growl - humming in the tips of my ears. The stomp of boots as Kami materialises - arms folding with a crisp snap of steel. Burning with tiny halos of gold. The reality behind the fiction Moon is planting in our minds. But still I feel it. Like a little voice: This is where Moon keeps its secrets. I turn to stare down a roped off hall, but it floods with dark. Hiding its interior, as a shadow of the monster steps - firmly - in my way. "There." Moon breathes. "And now we''re all alone at last..... So..... gather round, sweet little children. Gather round, and listen well to the plan.. To the Deal your leader created with me..... It raises spindle-thin arms, wide, beneath the blood-soaked drapes. Like some tyrant king before its puppets. For tonight we weave a grand old tale of Power and Vengeance.. A grim silver grin in the dark, as it embraces the room. Your own. Vengeance? With you..?" Kami whispers in shaky bravado, as it slips those long and delicate fingers into the folds of its coat. "Or against you?" "But surely you''ve realised, sweet beautiful angel...." Moon''s fingers reach for her rough, pinched, face as she staggers away. "....we''re all on the same side? That''s why I''m being so very Nice to you all. So very friendly and full of good cheer....." She twists away, in utter disgust. "You actually bloody are. That''s the sick part." "You see?" It whirls around her like a poison smoke. "Everybody has all their little limbs, and we''re all having a jolly good time...." "I don''t trust you. None of us should." Her bionic eyes twitch across the shifting gallery. Wary. Doubtful. But sharp. "What. even is this? More VR bullshit? Holos?" "Nothing you need concern your delicious little head about." The shadow-thing purrs, as that hand slips deeper.... deeper.... into its coat. Down and down. Further than''s possible. As if the arm is endless, and the pocket is too.. "Merely my little way avoiding.... prying eyes..... What should concern you is our Deal. And all its..... benefits." I sense its fingers close, the grin twisting wider. "But yes. We are very much on the same side...." Kamis eyes settle on me. I really doubt that. "Doubt away." Moon murmurs, as the the hand withdraws with a sudden snap. Pulling with it a gleaming slab of ice-black glass, finely graven into the shape of a gun. Oily. Charred. Roiling and rattling with violence and mayhem - like its almost alive. Runic cracks splitting and sealing along its length - flickering with scraps of Red, Red, radiance. Not red as in light. Red as in blood. Red as in the echo of what I. "I know that gun...." Kami breathes. "Holy shit..... That''s...." The Red Right Hand.. I breathe, and all my insides curl up into a knot as it calls to me. My fingers twitching with shadows of the deeper past. The weight of it, pressing deep into my palm. Like an echo of touch. An echo of when I pulled that trigger, and the barrel splayed wide into- My skull thuds from the inside as all the memories try to beat their way out. Memories of. Of screaming. Of madness. Of things I cant even tell you - at least, not yet. Of that thing in my grip. Blasting, pure, violent- Killing the monsters that- Ripping apart the- I grip my chest. Heaving. Shivering. Cold and hot inside - all at once. Looking away. Yes. You remember. Don''t you.....? Like a little..... addiction...." The gun hangs loose on its finger, daring me to grab it. "What a fun little rampage you had through The School with it, when I helped you escape.." The monster chuckles at some dark little thought. "Pity you didn''t flay any of your little friends by mistake..... But still.... You caused such.... a fun little mess.... it really blew me away.... The gun snaps, snug, into its palm. Quivering. Ready to massacre entire nations, at a whim. "If only you knew how this wonderous Beauty really worked.... You could have killed me! And your Lovely Mummy! And Daddy dearest, too....!" A sigh of desire. "It would have been.... electric....." My fists clench. My teeth too - sharp and violent. "They! Ain''t! Our! Parents!" A shudder, deeper than bone. "We got parents of our own....." I''m going to burn this bastard..... It needs us. I know it does. We can use that..... "Oh. If you say so....." It purrs, but my eyes are utterly locked on that.... that thing in its hand. That gun that isn''t a gun..... Even now, I feel the RAGE burning the flesh of my fingers. The sheer, freakish, POWER of it. And- You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. It''s more than memory. I can feel it. It''s like it''s almost- If I could just get hold of it for- I tear my eyes away, and the Right Hand carves a streak of bloody Red across my vision. Twisting toward the paintings, and the hallway that it hides. Focusing on that instead. "....don''t you want it....?" Moon breathes. "Vengeance? For all they''ve done? To take this Power for yourself, and use it? With my help, we could shove that Wicked Old Witch in her own oven....." Its words fade to noise as I focus on the utter black of that hidden hall. There''s a shadow. A glimmer of a painting, right at the end. A six-winged serpent, astride a Hellish hilltop. Crowned with glorious light - all legions of the damned falling, prostrate, before it. Tearing the very flesh off their bones, as an offering, and hurling it upon the jagged rocks before them. No. Not rocks...... Contorted, bloodied, flesh.... The image vanishes, with a snap, as the hall fills with bricks. As if I saw something I really, really wasn''t meant to..... Or maybe I was.....? Maybe it was bait.....? I nearly got you with that damn gun. I hiss, in sheer denial. "I had you." Yet here we both are. Moon murmurs. Low and giddy and mad. Because we both know what I saw, in that depths-dark void..... I just don''t know what it means. Something hidden deep within its lurid mind? Whispering to us in twisted metaphors? Can we use it? Or just Moon trying to twist us in circles? Like back when it trained us..... We can''t trust it, either way. "So? W-what..... And you''re just going to..... to give it to us?" Kami stutters in abject scepticism. Fighting to fix the cracks in her cold, hard, guise. "Are you serious? You think we''ll believe you?" "Give? You? This?" The thing mocks as it slips its masked face right into hers - forcing the barrel of that weapon to the side of her head. "Are you absolutely mad?" "PISS OFF!" Kami screams as she ducks away - smooth and fast. Fire exploding from her guns to blast holes through Moon - at me. I scream as I hurl myself into a skidding roll. Rocket-bullets ripping right past my face. Paintings bleeding with holes as their subjects die. "Kam! Stop!" "Shit!! Oh shit! Spook! I thought you were over-" Our heads snap to the dissolving echo of my shape, on the other side of the gallery. "Consider that a free lesson on.... situational awareness, lets say." Moon sneers, shamelessly. Reforming behind me. "But, no. To answer your little question of ownership..... This...." The Red Right Hand BURNS BEFORE ME. RIGHTIOUS WITH FURY AND- "This is mine. Consider it a little bit of insurance in case of...." Its eyes settle on Kami. "....accidents." "Then what? Why show us the damn thing?" I force through razor-edged teeth. Shaking with adrenaline. Burning with vengeance. But for all its games, threats, and casual attempts to murder us, I know Moon needs us. And if it wants us to free it, it''s going to feed us intel. Which might give us the tools to destroy it.... My eyes narrow as the gallery shifts with shadow. As all Moon''s many eyes flick to all its many corners..... As if.... even now.... it fears whatever it thinks might hear us.... And then it draws a second gun from its coat. Identical - except for the terrible, vibrant, soul-burning Blue that shudders up through the seams. "But this....." A low smile, twisted with cunning. "This I could lend you.... for the price of your assistance." The Left Hand of The Devil. I breathe. Oh yes.. Kiddy. Oh yes.. Or. at least.. a memory of it. Oh, how long it''s been since I saw it burn worlds.. A flicker in its eye - as if it said far, far, too much.... Or was simply lying. But now.? Now it lies broken. Scattered. Lost, but never destroyed.. It''s perfect, really...." My inhuman eyes follow every twist of the dangling weapons. Fixated on that dark, dark, weapon with a hunger I cant even describe. Tracing the shadow-smoke trails that hiss from those bright cracks of Blue. "And that... these things.... can kill our Stepmother.....?" Kami falters. Bring these weapons together, we could kill Death itself." It smiles that goading smile. As if it knows a little secret. "So what hope has your little Mummy or Daddy? Or you? She almost crows. Fixating more of its stare. The monstrous smile never flickers. Oh. Hypothetically. Moon breathes in goading delight, wrapping fingers around the plinths and crushing them to dust. But why-ever would you want to die my sweet, precocious, bestie? Im giving you. everything. Your freedom! Your hearts desire! Surely thats better than. horrific suicide..? Well.. Gotta test it on somethin. I try to jibe, to keep its focus split. But the thing above stares me down. Its slow smile ripping wide, and spiky. Oh. Well see about that, my scowling pet. But, for now.. It raises its left hand, burning with Blue. This is the only currency I have. So, Im afraid youll be competing for it with all the other escapee teams. That''s the Deal. I give you all a mission. The first to carry it out gets a reward.." "Competing?" My eyes widen, breaking away. The others. They got away!? They really- Moons gaze is bored. Oh yes. A few of your little friends are on the wind. Though Im afraid Mummy had to liquidize some of the. slower. teams. I swallow the chill. Ymean liquidate? Right? Spiky lips twitch upward. No. I swallow beneath its cold and terrible stare. "This stinks of a con. Kami snaps. Too many teams, not enough prizes. "Zhas." Demon nods. "Zis all smells of trickery." Damn right it does." She turns. Snarling. "I don''t know how you''re faking this, but I won''t let you control us any more. I wont let you. Oh, kiddy.. I dont have to control you so long as you do exactly what I say.. The monster chuckles at its own gentle mockery. But then it raises its searing Left Hand. But perhaps. a compromise. A little consideration for past. The eyes shine. .and future. playtimes. The gun burns away, like smoke. Leaving only a tiny shard leaking Blue like paint that stains the air. If I cant appeal to your honourless little hearts, Ill appeal to something baser. Greed. It tosses the shard at my face, and it embeds in my virtual map. The image expanding to show precise coordinates. A taste of success. Of working for me. A shard of The Left Hand, free for you to take.. At not cost at all. And there it is..... If we can get it. The death of Moon, given by its own left hand. I glance at Kami, who doesnt so much as unfold her arms. Her thoughts painted all over her flinty face. Obvious trap. No deal. No Deal.. Moon whispers. Its smile somehow even wider. Oh, my poor ~sweet~ little thing. My innocent little child. Oh, how nice it must be to be so very naiv. A thousand fingers jab at her heart. I dont need your consent. Your leader already took the Deal. Im just sweetening the pot by giving you a taste of the rewards...." It turns away, and the shadows roar up again. "I''ll leave you all to stew on what I''ve said. And taste my generosity.... But remember. It slips in tight to my tight-flat ear. My benevolence is beautiful, and my kindness beyond compare.. For those who keep their Deals.. It almost kisses my face. Close as breath. But the more effort I expend on you. The more resources I plough into you. The deeper you wrap yourself in my affairs. before you try to screw me. Foul mouths lick my face with vile little tongues. My legs hurling me away, into a roll. The more fun Ill have with you. and your little friends.. before I wring the blood out of your bones.. It bows, sweeping off its creepy hat like a performer. Goodbye.. Children.. For now.. And, with an utterly hideous snap, the monster and its gallery implode. Taking all its mad illusions with it. Silence rushes in. The storm wild and deep outside our little hollow. I shiver and hug my arms. Kami turning to me with rage and hurt in her eyes. Spook.. What have you done.... But she falters as my ears prick suddenly sharp. Demon leaping down, and rushing to my side. I spin about. I hunt. And. There. Right between the wrecks of two old cars. A single, piercingly, green eye. ..slitted, like a cats. >>><<< >> [Blocked] >> [Blocked] Thunder flickers, splashing the wrecked ships with gleaming reflections and jumping shadows. I drop to a crouch and, flicker-fast, that emerald eye vanishes into the jumping darkness. Trailing a tiny, light, little ding-ding-ding of sound into the broken ruins and savaged metal. The light dies, and I see a flicker of tail. The sharp breath catching in my throat. "Oh-" Kamis arms stay folded. What? Don''t- No. I saw. The eye shines again, beneath a different car. I flick a hand, and we slide into cover - our four-horned GMO [Berserker] skulking in behind. Lion-tail low, and undulating. Rrr. Ziss place has a smell of rats. GMO kind, or giant freaky mutant kind? Kami asks. Faux-casually. Checking her many pistols and knives, by the sound of it. Our boy sniffs the ground. Both. Rats with slitted green eyes, huh. Or, eye. My ears twitch as I check the angles. A breath of distant voices. A shush. A hand over a mouth.. I smirk. No alleys to jump us. Lotsa doorways though. Nothin to smell cept rats on the air. Zait is certain. Demon agrees, also smirking. I nod to him, with a low grin - fingers twisting through gestures. Demons square pupils follow them intently, then he nods. Bounding into a collapsed shop, and up through the hole in the ceiling. So. Ways outta this street? I add, louder. Cut through a building? Kami inquires in her sweetest tone - meaning lets blast our way through an actual supporting wall into probably some guys bathroom. Its that or go forward. Or. Back. I grimace. Oh come on, Spook. Just.. You ran along that edge road. You were fine. But she shivers at the still-dark spot where Moon just stood. As if thinking. I clench everything. I had. motivation. And a pair of total assholes dragging me. Spook. She says, earnestly. Youre our pilot. You flew us here. Sdifferent. I mutter, itching my neck. Feeling like a little kid caught in a lie. Lucky me, Demon pops back before she can literally strangle me. Waving and pointing from an upper window. I smirk, and nod. Well. Better get movin. Hey? Dispatch? You back yet? Zip? Nothing. Kami shakes her head, eyes roving. Hes only ever quiet when you dont want him to be.. Yeah. I gesture to her, subtle and fast - and she nods. I drop to all fours, and hop over a fallen rock - like Im sniffing about. But really I''m circling around - and fighting the urge to whistle innocently. Right in the corner of my eye, I catch Demon flow out an upstairs window. Disappearing behind a stack of old bins, in a leon-tailed flash.. Directly behind em. Kami saunters left, and I slip under the bulk of a huge busted construction drone. Ducking through a belly ripped open and pillaged of all usable parts. And.... there.... Another flick of bright green eye - quivering and blinking from behind a wreck. Jade claws gripping at the torn fuselage. It meets mine, widens, and whips outta sight. But I freakin blur. Diving round the drone - right as Demon blocks off his escape. My claws flash, and I grab a collar - lifting it with zero effort. Hi Tufty! Whatre you doin outta ya box? EEEEEK!!!!" The catboy squeals, a lot like a rat. "Ummm! AH! Meyowww~! Gosh! Spook! Oh heeeeey~!!! He whimpers coiling up in on himself like hes made of rubber bands - green tail whipping. Clawed hands and bare feet all clutched up together as a green fringe shifts down his tan face. Which he frantically plasters over the left side. Um. Um, you- Um. I drop the kid with a sigh, and he backs up. Fuzzy ears drooped. Eyes low and sad. Like a broken doll, with an extra floofy tail. Um. Yeah. Um. Kami materialises, with an evil grin, behind him. Golden dots blurring circles around her stealth cores. Found the rats, huh? Yknow, I warned you this little frea- Think Im missing one, actually. I interupt - loudly - glaring at her with narrowed lids. I sniff around. Then I wheel back to Tufty, with a big scary smile. Alright, kiddo. Now. I know you didnt get free without help. so wheres our little merchant of death, eh? Come on? Little buggers gotta be around here somewhere. Um- Uh- The cats one bright eye flits sideways, and I snort. Tossing him at Demon, who barely catches. Right. Well, if he aint here then. I reach under my cloak and grab some random-ass thing. .youre clearly being followed! So I better chuck this grenade behind that pile of bricks! AH!! HEY!!! W-WAIT!!! AHHH!! Some little dweeb yells - right on cue - and out pops the human half of Team Sneaky. Practically face-skidding down the pile, to land with a crash. And there he is. A goofy-ass black boy wearing. oh boy, where do I even start? Weve got stripy dress shirts - plural. One of which is, apparently, a cape. Boxers over trousers. A big floppy hat. Braces. Bowtie. And. Well. It just gets worse from there, frankly. Then, theres the energy. He bounds up, fixes his. lets call it a costume. And then a big cheesy smile splits his big brown face. HAHA! OH HI SPOOK!!! WE FOUND YOU!! He yells. Waving hard - like he just saw me - as all those happy little echoes blast across The Pirate Tower. WE- Shush ya face, ya little idiot! I yelp, clamping a big hand over his bigger gob - eyes wild in panic. Theres all bloody sorts about! And we just met freakin Moon. I motion to Demon, who hoists a wiggling cat. Dragging the pair of em a few blocks down the street - just in case. Finally - when Im happy were hidden - I round on the shifty duo. Seriously? Both of you? I sigh. Bloody Hell. Tuftys pointy ears sag even lower, bladed fingers twiddling. He glances mutely at Dimwit Number Two - who beams up at me, brightly. Rubbing the big puff of messiness he calls hair. UH, WELL- HAHA! He catches my grim look - mid-shout - and tamps the noise. AH! RIGHT!! SNEAKY VOICES!!!! He chirps happily - flailing at large, and waggling about energetically. So, uhhhhh.! Yeah! We got attacked by pirates!! And the chopper EXPLODED!!! So we had to run away!!! And- Badger. I sigh. Tha real version, Badger. But! But!!! He makes huge sulky eyes at me. Badger! My versions better. The kid huffs, kicking about with his brown toes. But. Well, uh - you all went POOF! Like, for real! And we, uh, we- Hahhaha! He looks away, and Im pretty sure thats an embarrassed blush. I mean, not that you can tell under dark skin and thirty layers of muck. But, I mean, in theory its under there somewhere. ..so we all super ran over to help.. Uh-hu? I lean down - claw-poking a Badger until the kid goes yeep! So. Comms got cut, n'' then ya snuck out? Unarmed And came looking for us? I poke him again. And ya bloody well let Tufty out. Even though ya know hes on probation? And maybe a spy? And is, quite possibly, going to turn us in? YEP! Badger beams at me, like he won a prize. So, uh - you okay then? Right? Yeah I bloody well am, you little twit! But I woulda been pretty bad if youd gotten shredded in all that back there! It was bloody bad stuff, Badge! Guys with guns! Rocket launchers! A tank! A chopper! Squads of soldiers, and mutant sewer things on bikes! Ooooh! So you did need help!! He cheers. I facepalm. No! No, squirt! I needed you safe. You and cat-butt. I point at the pair of em, and they squirm. I need- I glance at the left arm hes got stuffed behind his back. and sigh. Where''d your hand go? Oh? Um. The black kid looks suddenly glum, but he drags out the metal stump of a wrist. I um. yeah. left it behind! Cause its heavy! Hahah! But I didnt want you to see.. cause I. um. um. You didnt lose it. right? I tilt my head, but he shakes his - a firm no. You can tell because hes a blur. Great. So.. I stop, I frown - and then I lean closer. Way closer. Poking again. This time with the pads of my fingers - not a claw. Its hard to tell under all the crazy layers, but. yeah, that''s a lump. That aint armour under there. Is it? Um!! Um! The kid panics, trading looks with Tufty - who facepaws. Then he whips back to me, eyes huge. Um!!! "I told ya. Armour out on the-" I rub my face. Just. Just fork it over. Now. I sigh, and he nods glumly. Turning round to grab about inside his clothing - all while doing a little two-foot dance, like he needs the loo. Until he gets a firm hold on the contraband. Tufty''s eye dips toward it, then widens with an eep! as he starts edging for the huge pile of bricks. Oh boy, I was so wrong about the unnarmed part. Badger. Get it out. Slowly. I say, leaning back and looking for cover. Kami is actually walking backwards. Demon is just gone. And Im tempted to take a flying leap after. BUT!!! The little kid kinda slumps. You. You never. Badger. He gives up, and starts pulling all kinds of things out of the folds and pockets of that total mess he''s ''wearing''. So much so it actually starts to deflate. I get handed a teddy with one leg and a robot eye - which lets out a little fart of flame. Then a couple of suspicious packages, a few grenades, a weird mutant cluster smoke-bomb, a bundle of detonators, packs of explosives, a pipe bomb, and a few other odds and ends. Suddenly, theres a whole lot less Badger and a whole lot more ordinance. This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. Holy shiiiit. I breathe. Is this all of it? He nods, shyly. Really? He hands me another grenade. Really? A few more detonators, and some wire. Badger. Sulky, the kid passes me a blob of grey playdough - trailing wires. Careful as Hell, I drop it with the rest - staring at the haul. Then I poke him again, and he huffs loudly. Removing the ''cape''. The ''hat''. The... I don''t know what that is, frankly. But I par the wacky doofus down to his shirt, then shove him at Demon for a pat-down. This results in five more squibs, several.... things made of tape and buttons.... and a monstrous bundle of wires I find distressingly bleepy. I stare down at the haul, then back at a much thinner Badger. Kami, could ya get ya ass over here and make this crap safe? Oh Hell no!! I still remember last time! She yelps, from behind a busted wall. We lost the whole freakin building! My claws rub face as I sigh. Rounding on our tiny, yet adorable, terrorist. Seriously? No gun, but all this? Howd ya even pack it in there.? I glare at Tufty - now inching backward behind the wally. Well.. Ahahah. Badger laughs, nervously - but Kami bops the do to shut him up. Yknow what, I dont wanna know. I squint at the pile until Tutorial Mode activates - and a happy cartoon bomb pops up in the corner of my vision. Bouncing about and smilling at me. Hi! Im Boomy the helpful boom-boom!! Bombs are your friends!!! But lets practice disarming, just in case!!! Do you want to activate Tutorial Four: my bomb is ticking awful loud? Heck no! I wince. Activate the Bomb Helper Overlay. Ill figure it out. Sure thing, my boomy Boomer pal! A-HA-HA!!! Also, mute and then delete yourself. I grunt, flipping out a multi-tool. With fire. Oh no! My existence! It wails in terror, but I flick it away. Gotta concentrate, here. YAH!! Wait! No! Um- Badger starts as I tentatively tug out a blasting cap. Noooooo!!! He flops onto my back, and skids down - leaving, I assume, a double-streak of tears. But I keep on at it - methodically. Ignoring the dweeb. The pipe-bomb I just take the battery out of. Grenades I stick to my magnetic webbing. Eventually, theres just this package bristling with wires. I stare at it. Suspiciously. Oh boy, we got ourselves a Badger Special.. Shit!! Kami yelps from behind a wall. How bad? I frown. A. lot? My hand drifts to the battery. ..and Badger grabs it - wrapping small fingers and stump round my wrist. NO! SPOOK! NO! Its boobytrapped!! .of course it is. I groan. Shit, well.. I dunno - but I sure as Hell aint letting you do it. But- Huge eyes glisten. No! Youre nine! And youre already down a hand! I told ya! No bombs until youre twelve, and you never list- But Im REAL good with bombs!! He jumps on the spot. Im REAL good! Everyone says so, and- -then you blow them up. Badger looks away, and mutters something - but I just shake my head. But its true. he used to be good. He used to be top of the class. Absolute gold-star sudent of Demolitions.... Then.. Well. I an''t sure, actually. Then somehting. Damnnit." I pace. "Cant leave it. Cant disarm it. Cant- Its not even on. Badger grumbles. You gotta sorta pull that ring thing, then- I blow out a breath. Fine. Ill stick it somewhere, and hope it dont go..... Special. like the last one did. Wha? I do! THAT WAS BRUTAL!!! Everything went BOOM!!! AND IT WAS MEGA - ULTRA - AWESOME!!! He beams, waggling his whole body proudly. AND- Shhhhh! I said be quiet!! I growl, and he covers his big mouth. Well, crap. What now. I turn to find Tufty batting - playfully - at Demons tail with his knuckles. Leaping about as he tries to fight it. Demon, of course, takes it like a champ. He takes everything like a champ. Well. Alright then, you pack of twits. Let''s just..... Let''s find Zip, then grab up dinner and g. Hey, wait a sec!" I blink - and they both jump. "We''re off network! We''re bloody Signal Blocked! So howd you pair o wallies find us with no tracker!? "YEEEP!" Tufty leaps right off his toy - tail vanishing between a baggy trouser-leg as one visible eye whips about. Uh, ummmm, uh.. Meeeywwww.. He squirms, twisting his neon-zombie-unicorn-massacre t-shirt so hard he makes a total mess of the terrified cupcake civilians. But Badger just laughs it off. OH! YEAH! HAHA! YOU TOTALLY VANISHED!" He whoops, copping another bonk round his empty brain-box. "Uh, I mean?" He rube it, because it was Kami that time. "We sorta saw where you were before? Right? Coz of your tracky thing? He points at the side of his head, then conjours a fuzzy virtual map - like a floating wrist-screen. Beaming proudly all the way. Haha! YEAH! We kinda got super lost for a bit, though, when.. Tufty shakes his head very rapidly. But AH! I mean, we lost you! Yeah!! You just went POOF! But we SUPER knew where we were! And we werent lost!!! So we, uh, we just kinda followed the street! Yeah! And then we FOUND you! And here we are!! He beams - but only for a second. Uh. Huhuh. Spook! Your.... your eyes twitching again! I make a mad grab at the kid, and he yeeps - bolting behind Tufty. Who aint a whole lot bigger, despite the multi-year age-gap. If ya lost us when you were already out. I purr. Then you were already out when ya lost us! So ya fibbed. Didnt ya? Um. Uh? Noooooo? I was, just sorta um- HAHAHA! Badger stutters in a panic, eyes darting. So I stare down our skinny emo kitty - who cracks, instantly. Ah!! Were sorry! Meeeewww! So when did you REALLY leave? Huh? I snarl, and they eeeep like Im attacking. No, wait, I got me an educated guess. You weird lil buggers were in there with Zip when he called about pizza whatsits.. So I bet you hopped out that door the moment that big Pirate party happened. That about the size of it? Um.. Golly. I mean.? Maybe? Tufty babbles that slitted green eye flashing wide. Busted. I smirk, folding my arms. So. You left way earlier than ya said, and for dumber reasons. Way before we vanished, I bet. I fold my arms, and smirk. So.? We, um.. Tuft mumbles, staring at my knees as Badger nudges the kitty furiously. Like he was about to drop em both the kack. I get down between em. You. I point at Badger. Are nine. And you.... I jab at the kitty - who cowers. ....are twelve. Thirteen. Ish. Maybe. Whatever. Ya both bloody old enough to know better, but dumb enough to do it anyway. And you, kitty- Ummmm, but Spook- -were on probation. A vile look slaps across the felines face, and he stops squirming - turning away. A shadow of before. So. Whyd you do it? Badger winces. Ummmmm. Cause you- Oi! No! Dont blame me! I wanna know why you didnt do what you were bloody told! You didnt even bring a gun! And in a bloody Pirate tower, too! Where they sell little kids for a few bloody vials! I mean, shit, we passed. I breathe out, fighting it down. So why? They droop even harder, and Tufty shrinks into a sad little crouch. Um. Meeeeow. Cause were stupid? Meeeow. He mumbles, shivering so hard all the chains on his trousers tinkle. And the bell on his collar, too. Damn right you were. And what did I say? Be smart. They mumble. Or? .youll slap the stoopid outta us.. He finishes - and I flick em both round the ears. Which is way easier when one of em has such big tufty lugs. Well. If you aint filleted up for some Aristo restaurant first. Or worse - nabbed by the bloody Berks and bunged off to School. They cringe - then cringe even harder. So. You got me? No more of this? I waggle my arms, generally. Kay Spook. They mumble - and we all gloss right over the few, slight, tactical omissions from my list of Horrors. Aka the nightmare things even Moon is scared of..... Almost like we dont want to talk about it. Alright.. Alright. Now.... Cmon - lets got find our bloody dinner. I start walking again, then hesitate. Hey. Wait another sec. I round on em again. How the Helld you even get Tufty outta lockup?? Badger squeaks. Tufty squeaks louder. And I start channeling my ole dad. RRRAAH!!!! Im gonna bloody marmalise the pair of you!! AHH! I dunt wanna be a marmalade!!! Tufty wails, bounding off on all fours as Kami starts laughing. I breathe out very hard through my nose, make a brief strangling motion - then spin on a heel, and storm off. Gah! We only brought Badger along to split up the other Terrible Two! And Tufty so Badger wouldnt get bored and distract Zipper! But. Yeee. Speaking of. Zip! Oi, Zip!! I try, yet again - and this time I get a low crackle of a voice. Sp-KKRRRK-k!? Mat-sssssss! Y-ure, like cutt-g o-t. Yeah, I bloody know!! Moon pulled some kinda signal-blocking bullshit, but were okay. Barely even tried to murder us. Huh-rrrr. Weeeiiiirrrrrdddd-ururrr- Zip? Zip?? I shrug. Guess hes- A loud pop - then a SKREEEE! of blinding noise violates my poor, poor, augmented ears. I groan hard, ramming the volume down. But not much I can do with it routed right into my implant. I cant pull that out like an earbud. Lucky me, though, I didnt have volume on max. Unlike our poor cat. Badger pats Tufty on the head until it clears. Then theres a second of silence, and we hear back from Zip - who is now a broken robot, by the sounds of it. HeY? Hey?? GuYs? CaN yoOOOoou hEAR mE nOOow?? Gotcha, Zip. What the Hell was that?? Uh, yEEEah. mate, I dont got a cluuuuuue. This is sOooome, like, real serious comms Disruptor shiiiiit. Youre slap in ~ppppffff~ dead-zone. Really? I hadnt noticed. What I wanna know. Kami growls, eyes streaking up the blasted street. Is how Moon pulled that off. If it was holo drones or nanoTek, theyd be screwed too. Right? Right, yeah - abOoout that. Zip swallows, like hes worried Ill explode at him. Yeah, Im noOot, like, uh - seeeeeing any L.M.G. droOones? Like, nOooot at all? Well, liiiike, cept the stoOooolen ones? Still think its our implants. Kami adds in. C-cant saaay, mate. All I know is, its - liiiike - solid Pirate drones on scoOope. They aint in the blocker zone, but yeah. Ive had to shooooot down a bunch already. Pol might know, but- Wait! Shit! Shit! Shit!! Hold on.! He goes dead for a second, and I glance back up the street. Badger and Tufty are chasing round Kami, whos getting ready to slap em. Oops! Back! Sorry mate. Like, Pirates with net-drones on my ass. Its like they live here or something. He chuckles. Must like my new jets. Right. Right. You got a handle on this blocker then? Kiiiinda, maaaate. Weird thing is, like.. I cant find whats doing it? Something new? I mutter. DunnOooo mate - but everythings still, like, bloooOOocked and- What? Still? Hes right, I cant get Kami or Demon on comms - and theyre right there. Zip, howre you gettin a signal in here..? Static hisses, and I sigh. Welp. Hes gone again. Kami stomps over. What the hecks up with this blocker? Does Moon think. She shares a look with Demon, then me. .They know were here? Or is the lanky shit just trying to screw with us? Demon growls over a wall. Possible to be both. Thing is.. If he can find us.. Kami hisses with low terror. .They can. A shudder runs through the group, and Tufty''s eye goes utterly mad and shakey. The kid shrinking into a little huddle over his tail and toes, shuddering and clawing at his hair. No! No! I didnt mean to be Bad, Mummy....!" He whispers. "I didnt! Mummy and Daddy Love Us Lots And Lots.....! Mummy and- STOP IT! They aint our parents, and-! Kami snaps, and I field her quick as Demon drops to pet the shaky cat. Badger piling in, too, with all the delicacy of a pro-wrestler. Its okay! Youre alright! He announces, and I catch a small - faltering - smile from a very squashed Tufty. I share a look with Demon, and Kami. And we smile too. But its a different look. Involantary. Harsh. Like two motherly fingers stuck themselves in the corners of our mouths, and pulled.. Slowly, without thinking, Badger raises his only hand - sticking the thumb into his mouth.. God. I wish I could hug em, but.. .I cant.. So I get down low, and look Tufty right in the eye. They aint our parents. I emphasise. Hard. Got it? Theyre bloody pretenders. I breathe out, rubbing my face. We got a real mum and dad. We do. And They aint it! And were never going back to. They all stare at the ground - smiling Big Happy Terrified Smiles. Stop it! Stop! Were safe now, and wed bloody die before we go back! Yhear me? Some nod - and Badger throws himself at my chest. But I dodge back. Shivering in pain. Tufty stares down at his jade toes. I wish I could just. Just. I stop. An eyebrow rising. Hey. Any o ya hear. music? I blink, sharply. "Is that.... The bloody Zipper??" > > >< < < >> A Carnival Of Crime >> A Carnival Of Crime
## [Omega Team: Zero] battleLink [reconnected] by the [Great Foresight] of Our Glorious Leaders. ## Glory to The Leaders! Glory to the Revolution!
A blast of triumphal, trumpeting, music splits the air with a ''Da-da-da-DA! Da-da-da-DAAAH!!'' Rising. Rising. Along with a screaming roar of tiny engines, and I smile for real. ZIP! I yell as a tiny fleet of custom-built combat drones blast around the corner. Sharp, jetfighter, profiles. Wingtips waggling. Edges blazing with neon streaks of light. Mate! Yeah, like, I broke through the jammer! AND the Pirates! He crows in my ear - sudden, loud, and aggressively clear. You got em all? I shout back. Hah, yeah! Like, ten kills for Zip - and the Pirate scum get Zip! Good work! They backing off? YEAH MATE! Cant argue with tiny missiles! Yknow? Right?" He coughs. "But I gotta watch out right now! Ive only got the one gigantic magical extendo-cock, so if they break it- You. What? I say as Tuft blinks and Kami makes a ''wut'' face. Only the one what? Say again? And, oh boy, I can hear the bugger smirking. One gigantic magical extendo-cock, mate! Its a bit bent, like - but it does the job! A bit. Yeah! Helps it get round corners! And, you know, into cramped spaces? Right? Its very flexibl- Zipper.. I groan, rubbing my face. And, yknow, I can even tie it in knots if I want! Right? And it shoots lasers out the end- Zip. Are you talking about a bloody drone here, or did you get an implant I really dont want to know about? Heh. Just a drone, mate! Came with the ship! Box calls it, uh" Scrabbling noises. "The Patriotic Bonds Of The People Which Crush The Tyranny Of Foolish Capitalist Interference. Ah yeah. One of those. I state, wryly. Whats that in plain Lingo? Uh, like, signal blocker. unblocker?" He explains. "It''s like a bunch of drones? Yeah? All hooked together? I rub my face. And why, oh why, do ya call it- My gigantic magical extendo-cock? Zip snickers, and I can practically feel the bright blue eyebrows waggling. Oh, like, thats easy mate. Cause they start off all small and scrunched up in a little package, then, like- Zipper.. I groan in instant regret, as Demon pats Badgers baffled head. -I gotta just whip it out- Zipper! -of its bag, like. Then- Zipper this better not be another bloody- -and it just sort of extends? Yknow? Zipper!! I choke as he cackles like The Dark Lord of Knob Jokes. Are you yanking my bloody chain again!? Hes ''yanking'' something alright. Kami giggles, and I groan into my claws. Tufty spinning away - plastering his ears down. Zip.. Just.. What is it really? He sighs. Mate. You are, like, no fun. Seriously. A blip - and he sends me a video. It''s just a buncha tiny, flat, vaugely hexagonal flying-saucer drones stacked up like. a pillar. Definitely a pillar. Which resembles absolutely nothing else, no matter what Zip says. It activates, with a blip, and the ''plates'' lift off each other. Making the pillar..... ''taller''. And then - as one - they tilt rotors to buzz away into the stormy night, as if tied together on a rubber rope. Forming a - admittedly very long, but very rattly - trail of hovering objects. "Ooohh!! How does it work!? What''s it for!?" Chirps a loud voice bobbing round about my shoulder as Badger jumps to see my vScreen. Pestering him with endless, oddball, questions - faster than breath. Heh, alright, lil mate - so, basically you know how you can''t get a signal through a blocker? Right? It''s, like.... artificial interference jamming up the airwaves?" He mimes a finger jabbing a wall. "Yeah! The signal all goes-" Badger throws up his arms, and wobbles about. "Right." Zip snorts. "Well, Corp would use quantum stuff to get round it. Super high tek. Totally hard to block. But, like, we''re really cheap-" He coughs. "Old-school." I snark. "Yeah! So instead we just make, uh, like..... a big conga-line of drones? And bounce laser-signals between them?" "OOH! Deadly lasers!?" "Ah, no mate. Just like, pulsing laser signals? Yknow? Only, it''s a bit awkward to do cause I''ve gotta have line of sight, Because, y''know, lasers dont go through walls-" "Mine do!" Badger cheers, then slaps a hand over his own mouth. "If I had any!" "Ignoring that." I groan. "Yeah, so, anyway - I kinda gotta thread them over buildings? And round walls? So, basically, I have to leave parts of-" -your giant magical extendo-cock- Kami titters. -at every corner. Like. Heh. So it can bounce the laser? You get me? And if theres a big bend in the street, it takes - like - two or three? Zips cocky smirk reappears - followed by the rest of him. So yeah, my extendo cock can get pretty gigant- Fine. Zip. I get it. Just." Sweet mother of- ".....keep up.. best you can. I shake my head. God damn. Alright. Cmon, losers - lets go get some bloody pizza things. Finally. Alright! YEAH!" Badger cheers. "Got it mate! You''re nearly clear of the blockers, anyway! So here we go, like! Mapping a safe route! Spindle-jets scream as his mini aircraft spit off down the street, tailing tiny streaks of blue flame. Badger whooping and punching the air as our drone-tek shoots off directions, like its a party game. Yeah! Left! Right! Left! Then left! No! Wait! Like, right! But then you gotta I calm him down, and we get marching - me ahead, the rest tailing off. Guns out under cloaks as Zips drones race in circuits above. The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. But for all the festival air, were all of us on edge. Every car is wrecked. Every shop a blackened hole. No life. No people. Just cracked pavement, rotted shutters, and a rolling shadow of unease. As if.... something.... happened here. Something we should know about.... but never will. Something that broods in the alleys. In the rusty depths beneath the cars - where things scuttle, just outside the light. In the fungal fronds that drift, as if on the wind...... or the weird symbol sprayed across a dozen broken buildings. A bright crimson eye, in a bleeding-red triangle.... We shiver. "Gang war, right?" I ask as Badger and Tuft huddle round Demon. Former copying latter, since Badge is basically impervious and.... well... I think Tufty got all his ''pervious'' somehow. "Mate, who knows right? Could be? Or..... maybe from The Before?" "Yeah. Maybe...." I mutter. Not asking what ''Before'' he means. There''s too many. Way too many. Before the Pirates came? Before The World Council fell? Before a thousand other things - some myth, some not.....? Could be any of em, really. But the gangs have made their mark, either way. The walls all painted with stuff like dis Bork turf and ''run why u can?''. Or, my personal favourite: Borc croo 2 gud 4 u. Think theres two guys called Bork? Or one Borc who cant spell? Kami wonders. Eh. Dunno. Hope we dont meet either of em. I chuckle as we clamber over a massive barricade built of dead cars and slip our way into a tunnel built of salvaged wrecks. Little more than shadowy shapes - scuttering under and over, and around. Fleeing our tiny but literal airforce. But wherever Borc (and his hypothetical twin, Bork) are, it aint here - and soon we curve back onto track. Passing from dark and strange into the friendly twinkle of bright shops, working cars, unbent lamps, and colourful locals - who try to rob us. Pirate tower. What can ya do? I snort as the latest batch of little tossers flee our wall of guns - trailing bent pipes, and mockery. Nuclear ordinance. Kami notes, grimly. But there theres a heck of lot to like, I think, as dark streets break open into a neon bazaar of delights. The maze of buildings erupting into the heavens as we hit the hollow core of the megaTower. A vast, central section of the tower simply missing - leaving us staring up into an explosion of neon light. A bajillion cyberTek surgeons, street-artists, noodle bars, gadget shops, and- Holy shit, like - is that a Ferris wheel!? Like, hanging off the side!? Zip says, reappearing in a flash of neon blue cubes as all his drones tilt toward it. It bloody well is! And its bloody huge!" I whisper in awe. And it really is - jutting from the edge of a massive walkway, like some fairytale thing. Spinning with whimsical reds and yellows. And, knowing Karrak, held on by sticky tape and wishful thinking. But theres so much more. So much. That entire floor is a casino, bigger than any cathedral. Begging all to come, come.... bet your life. Bet your soul. And, strung up above it, like an accident waiting to happen, a massive laboratory built of glowing pipes that seems nailed to the belly of the megaFloor above. All filled with masses of living slime that slithers and twitches against the glass. And thats just first blink. It just goes up, and up, and up.. Layers upon layers. Impossibility upon improbability. Chemicals bubbling in a drugstore window. Biolabs promising me an extra long life. Or extra long legs. Or fur. Or scales. Or fangs and claws - just like your GMO friends. Or nanoTek to make you invisible, and invincible. Ships that can outfight anything..... Whatever you dream. at the sketchiest price.. And that''s just what we see. Zippers drones beam us a dozen views of the great pit, from above. Revealing Karrak''s biggest Black Market - strung from fat cables and grav-drives, right over the maw itself. In all its chaos and glory. And I do mean an actual market. All hacking tools and robot arms gleaming in custom rows - behind inch-thick glass. Cyber-surgeons with grafted arms in armoured operating booths. Or just plain tables and mats - crammed full of, cough, legally acquired goods. But I focus on the hungry gap beneath that swaying platform, and shiver. Flipping the vScreens away. But what do I need with screens? Karrak has everything. A thousand delights to make the devil wince. A billion laws broken, in some country with laws. Refugees, dictators, anarchists, and mercs. Madmen, and freaks. Freethinkers and geeks. Plus, escapees like us. Youll find em all here, somewhere - gGambling the night away with the tourists, tinkers, and terrorists for hire. Smell that? I sniff. Dragging in a great sizzling wiff of grease and sensual simMeat. Or monster ribs, blinking full of unexplainable eyeballs - if ya swing that way. Plus the real stuff too - but dont ask where that came from. We waft on past the hotdog vendors - some with two heads or a tentacle arm. The sweet-sellers with their candied cocaine. Taco places and Asian bars. Ice cream, and honeyed pastries. All hawking to kids and passers-by. Demon keeps a firm grip on Badger and Tufty as we pass. And good thing too. Theres just. so much. So many sounds. So many sensations, smells, colours, and whatsits to poke. With textured tile-paths beneath us, and warm brick from the elder days. With skyWays, and steps, and statues with no name - covered in funky graffiti. Artefacts lost, and plaques torn away. Echoes and symbols of a bygone age..... Right! Were on track! Next street over, and bam! Yeah! Zip cheers as his tiny jets loop overhead. Others streaking in from above. Spying through upstairs windows. Looping in and out of the constant battle and/or thoroughfare glittering above. Dive-bombing an excited Badger, and a skittering - scaredy-cat - Tufty. Whooshing back up into the dark above, to damn-near cartwheel across the inside of the tower. Damnit! How the fu- Kami flips a glances down at Badgers big, impressionable, eyes. -the heck does he control them all?? What? I grunt, trying to un-cling Tufty from my leg. Hey. Can I borrow ya pliers, real quick? That is definitely not the LMGs shitty drone AI! She continues with annoyance, swatting a pixel-faced fighter hovering right at her elbow. Rrrgh! That thing can barely- Barely stay upright! So how is he doing it? Science, mate! Zips avatar smirks, offering zero elaboration. Science nothing! Our sceptical [Sniper] scoffs. Thats got to be forty drones up there! And Spook nearly had an aneurism controlling... a... a couple of turrets! And that was with help. So what program is he using? She turns to the massive thing made of triangles and eyeballs stuttering, on the edge of existence, beside me. Hey. Come on, right? Its you, isnt it? Youre helping? Or you made him an AI bot controller or something? Zipper does not allow me to tamper with his drones. Thats a lot of crap, and you kno- She stumbles again, as Zip makes another whizzing pass - all gloating LED faces, and speed. Tell me! Come on! Pfff, I dunno? Why you askin? I shake out my leg in a whirl of green and googly eyeball. Dang, hes really on there- No! I add, as a truly gleeful Badger leaps on the other leg. Oi, gerroff ya little-!! How''s it you''re the dang copycat!? He''s the cat! Mew! Badger chirps. Look. All Im saying is- Kami grinds teeth at my lack of attention, knocking on the back of my armour. Hey! Hey! Spook? Look. You grew up with him, right, and I didnt. So what''s his dumb trick-? Oh, hes always been like this. I swing my legs harder - my armoured joint-servos whining pitifully. Weeeee!!! Mew! Badger cackles. What? Kami glares at me. Oh, come on! Now I know youre all messing with me. She pivots to Demon, who shrugs. Seriously? "Kah. I do not know?" Im just awesome, mate! Deal with iiiiit! I rub my face. Yeah. Showy asshole used to play bleedin'' games vs himself. Two controllers at once. Two!? My best is four, mate! Zip yells as he zips past. Fff-!? FOUR!? How does that even work!? Better than yad think. I mutter. But waaaaay worse than he does. Hey! C''mon! Like, Ill thrash you all at once! Like, four different games!! Controllers only! Uh huh? Kami laughs at his now-snarling drone, waggling her head at it. Come on then, drone boy! I can take you! Oh, like, that''s it! Gloves off, mate! Gloves off! Im gonna beat you all! Yeah, yeah! Blue-boy! Go on! Go ''wrangle'' your ''gigantic magical exten-''!! "WWOOOOO!!! WE''RE HERE! WE''RE HERE!!!" Badger erupts, nevertheless maintaining his grip as I stagger the last few metrics to the huge pizza icon floating in mid air. I flick a hand through it, and our Augmented Reality takes over. Reviews and stickers exploding from it in a stream to ring around the entrance. "Right then.... Here goes nothin''." I say, checking I still got the little bandoleer of glowing vials that pass as currency round here. Each one shimmering with the tiny silver chips they call ''coin''. Only a few Mils left. But enough, maybe, for one big blow-out meal before we gotta get ''creative''.... "Hey, trust me mate." Zip''s avatar grins. "It''s gonna be awesome!" > > >< < < >> Irreparable Damage? >> Irreparable Damage?
## Current Funds: 135? Currency Selected: Karrak ''Fluid'' ?. Aka ''Old Blood''. Aka ''Blood Money''. Notes: The nebulous nation of Karrak has no "official" currency, but "Blood Money" is the closest you''re likely to get. WARNING: Hording money is an act of treason! All sized/found assets must be turned over to a superior officer for the use of The People!
We, of course, hit that pizza joint like a freakin bomb full of hungry kids. Tufty mewling and hopping about - Badger whooping like hes not eaten in days. I take a cautious look round, and raise my eyebrows. Dang - pretty freakin swank.... for Pirates. Lush red-and-gold wallpaper, illegal (well, not here) plastic plants, and even a brassy gold chandelier. Zips avatar laughs, drifting beside us Hey! Yeah! Here we go! Like, I got it on the good word - its totally legit, I swear! No giant mutant cockroaches or anything!" "Words to inspire confidence." Kami deadpans. "Yeah. Just, like, uh....... I hear this guy is kinda like a mob boss, so make sure you pay in full.. Right? Copy that. Dont stiff the stiff. I mutter, barging in after the rabble to try. The bell on the counter tinkling as Badger and Tufty leap to smack it, jumping about and mewling for food. A few tough-guys peer at em from the tables - and snort. Others, weighing us a little harder. But barely more than a glance. "Yeah, hey.... settle down alright?" I hiss. Which may as well have been petrol to put out a fire, as far as Badger is concerned. "WWOOOO! FOOOODDDD!!!!" Hello, small peoples! Welcome! Welcome! Bellows a great big hairy-armed chonk of a man, squashing his belly over the counter to see us. Please! Please! Be welcome, and have a seat! They call me ''Big Fat Turkish Tun'', and Im everybodys uncle! HAH-HAH-HA! His belly literately waggles with that laugh, and Badger stares at it in mesmerised awe. Momentarily silanced. "So huuuuge..... So wibbbly....." Seconds later we flumph down. Arranging tails, horns, and extra limbs to pack everyone into the booth. Zip, of course, sliding in at the end - on a virtual chair. ''Tuncay The Turk'' - or Tun, as he prefers to be called - soon fusses back in with menus for all and crayons for Badger. Who promptly brings items one and two together before I can stop him. But Big Tun doesnt mind - he doesnt mind anything. Oh, hes fine! Dont you worry! AHAHAHA! It''s just a bit of plastic! Mob boss? Seriously?? Kami mouths behind his bustling back, folding five or six arms. Come on, Zip! You worried about that guy? I could take him! No guns or anything! She flexes a thin steel bicep, and I laugh. for a second. But then I grow a little cold inside. And dark thoughts rise. Hey. Yknow. I mouth back as he sorts us out. Comms taking over, as my lips barely move. That.. that bloody look-how-harmless-I-am routine hes got? That seem familiar to you.? Our eyes follow Big Tuns chubby hands as he does some little magic trick with a napkin for the shorties. Badger oooing as Tufty claps - claws clicking. But I flick eyes at Kami. Like, really familiar? Like...... Ah, c''mon mate, hes like a big Badger. Zip scoffs. But his eyes are suddenly cautious. Flooded with memories. Kami slides out with me, on pretext of needing the loo - which I sorta gotta. But five steps later, she turns on me - leaning a fine selection of hands on armoured hips. Feels familiar? You dont think.? She doesnt mention The School. Or the people hunting us. Or the way they trick, and catch, little kids. And I guess it wouldnt mean much to you, or anyone, if she did..... But thats the level of fear, here. She doesnt even mouth the thoughts in both our heads. She doesn''t have to. A little twitch of the head is enough. he''s... one of Theirs? A plant? Or maybe just ex LMG, or- Her eyes widen. WOAH, SPOOK! SHIT-! STOP! She slaps my nervous, drifting, hand - and I realise, suddenly, where it was going. Where we are. And I rip it away from the gun beneath my cloak. All the laughter in the room stutters to quiet. I didnt mean to. I didnt think. I. If she hadn''t yelled.... Children! What did I do? Big Tun quails against the sudden, fixated, silence - a lot of the jolly leaving his voice. Several of Big Tuns friends and customers half out of their seats - staring at us. Mate! Zip panics, flickering to block me. Like, seriously - cmon, Spook! Its just some guy! He- Like- Hes been here for years! It aint an ambush! Yeah? You''re safe, okay? You''re safe. I totally checked up on him! Im. s.... I let out a breath, staring at Tun. Sorry. Im.. Sorry. You aint. Weve. Its been a long bloo- A long. day. Shaking, I shove my way out the door. Dropping into the dark beside the steps. Where I belong. Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Fight the images. Fight the- I lean against the wall, then turn my back to slide right down it. Sitting right on my SMG. It feels so much safer in the dark, even with the scabs on the corners, eyeing up my worth. I dunno why. Maybe its. Yeah. I just dont like being in that big box of light that everyone can see into, but no bugger can see outta. Its been a long few years in the light. Mew? Something velvety flicks my face, and theres Tufty crouched beside me - slow-blinking in worry. His cat-eared hoodie hanging half off his cat-eared head. Kid bats at me with his knuckles - but stops when he sees my face. Drooping into a low hunch over clawed feet, fretfully tucking that ear into its home with his sharp green nails. I catch a single, brightly slitted, eye - green as malachite - peeping beneath his fringe. But he looks away. On an instinct deep outta my past.. From when we were little. my hand twitches up, as if to pet his head. But then it drops back. Gripping the other. Damnit. I cant even pat him, to tell him its fine. Its a struggle to touch, when touch is used against you.. over and over..... But he shifts away too, seeing it rise. I guess weve both had a rough. few. God, how long did we belong to. Them.? To that School? If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. How much was real? How much was VR? I mute my mic, so the others dont hear, and he does the same. Ydont.. I start - but what? What can I say? Shyly, he butts his head under my arm - like he did when he was small. Flopping onto my lap. But I cant. I shuffle out of it, and sit nearby. Best I can do is ''arms length'', as far as comforting hugs go. Him not looking at me. Me not looking back. He doesnt even grab my hand or tail in his claws, or pounce on it, like he used to. Damnit. I feel like a voyeur in my own damn head.. Like Im not actually me - Im just watching me. Im- SPOOK!!! Badger screams, bashing through the door. Somehow out of breath. SPOOK! SPOOK! Big Tun says hes sorry!! Whu? I frown at the kid. What? YEAH!!! Tons of Big FAT Turkish Tun! Hehe! He, ah! He says he dunno what he did, but hes super sorry and stuff. Uh. No. No, it aint him. He didnt do anythin. I look away, and shudder. Its all my fault. I Just, like, tell the bugger Im sorry? Okay? OKAY! Badger spins around. SPOOK SAYS SORRY, MISTER BUGGER!!! Tufty implodes with silent giggles from his fuzzy huddle near my lap, shaking gleefully. I laugh - sorta - and push off the ground. Yep. damage control time again. Seriously, gonna have to watch my words with the lil one-armed bandit. OOH!! SPOOK! You coming!?! And Tufty?? We got milkshakes, and theyre BRUTAL!! The boy bursts with glee all over me, tugging my arm. Cmon! Cmon!! Cmon!!! I guess. We slip back inside - trying not to make eye-contact with anyone. Especially the guys with guns now laid out in VERY clear view. Guess they take their pizza pretty damn seriously round here.. We make it back to a booth that would be a lot more discrete if Badger wasnt in it. Big Tun bustling over to ask about milkshakes. Anything you like - so long as its chocolate, strawberry, banana, mint-choc, or vanilla! AH HAHA! Ah, mint-choc I guess. And sorry about earlier. It was. My fault. Old memories.. Gosh thats an interesting salt shaker. Truly an example of its kind. And that napkin dispenser? A++. Really tie the room together. No problem! No problem! HA HA HA! I stare at furniture, and my claws, he bobbles off like a big balloon full of pizza. Another twitch of suspicion fires through me, but I lock it down tight. Breathing so hard I jump when Badger pounces Tufty. WOO!!!!! Look Spook! Im a kitty too! A COPY kitty! He yells, goofy bits of menu stuffed in his puffball hair like cat ears. Tufty covers his mouth, trying not to laugh as Badger crouches on the seat and mewls. Batting at Tufts tail, one handed. I shake my head, and laugh, but Kamis laser-sharp eyes grab mine. We have to talk. About Moon. She murmurs over comms, four elbows on the table. Im expecting a rant - possibly about not getting shot in a pizza shop - but what comes next is maybe worse. Badgers milkshake. Every flavour. Are ya serious? I groan as he skewers a straw into ice-cream thick - weirdly coloured - gunk. Mmmh! I shake my head. Yknow ya got chocolate twice? Right? I mean. I tail off as he starts emptying sachets full of ranch into the cup. Kid, you need ya head examined. Huuuh?? What for? He blinks, reaching for the ketchup. One cat-ear dangling by a thread. Spook. Kami butts across him as Big Tun swoops back in with a basket of sizzling fries. Freshly synthesised from premium nutriSlop. Youre the bloody leader, but if you screw it up Ill kick your ass. Not likely. I smirk. Hey, Ill do it. She growls, waggling a one of the chips. Until then well follow you. But you gotta step up. You gotta make the right choices here. With when to draw for one. I wince. But also with Moon. I mean.. Is this damn weapon really worth it? She stirs her ketchup. Thinking. I know. I know youre planning to screw him. her. it. The fry waggles. ..whatever that damn thing is. Youre gonna betray it. Right? Right. I frown, as Tufty steers Badgers fistful of fries away from his admittedly ketchup-filled milkshake. I dunk one of my own - not in my drink - and shake my head. Moons a total bastard, and its gonna double-cross us. And it knows we know. It aint gonna bloody leave us alone, neither. Its got out damn number.... somehow. So.. So. I bite my chip. So, its Moon''s favourite game again. Kami keeps stirring, like shes forgotten what shes doing. "Who can double-cross who first." Yeah." I nod, shanking. "Hell, I bet that big scary-asshole routine. that was part of it. Maybe to stop us thinkin. Keep us in line. Or some bigger game. But we cant ignore this deal. I jab my own fry. More missions we do, the more we- I hesitate, eyes flicking to the pirate-filled room. -o that weapon we get. Its going to dangle it, that much is obvious. A few bits here. A few there. Enough to use it. But never enough to oppose Moon. I nod. Spread it wide, among all the teams. Set us against each other. Thats just the obvious part. Kami growls as the fry squashes to paste in her fingers. She drops it, and rips another from the vanishing pile. Zips eyes fixed on the salty snack like a GMO. Its got some deeper game here. I guarantee it. Moon always does. Probably related to those actual missions it wants us to run. She flicks the mushed fry into Badgers begging mouth. So. We want all of this thing, we gotta go off the books. Behind its back, I mean. Her eyes flicker with little lights. Those missions it wants done as payment. Theyre aimed at getting it free. So. That means theyll be rich with intel on Moon. Her smile turns nasty. Intel it cant control. Had the same thought. I mutter, kicking claws under the table to fend of a little idiot. Thatll be part. But Moon said this weapon was scattered. Broken. That means. She leans in harder. We play this right. We can find the bits Moon doesnt know about. And doesnt want to tell us about. We break the damn drip-feed, and take it for ourselves. She leans back, sucking down a tiny slurp of choc mint cream. Then she wipes her mouth, balling the tissue weirdly. Making faces. Did she just- What do you think? I dunno. I mutter, an image of that shard appearing in my hand. Unseen by all but us.. Uh, like, you guys gonna order for me? Zip ventures in an unusually shrill voice. Jerking me out of it. What? Ye dont like the fries? I smirk, offering him one. Arent ya gonna have any? Mate! Ah, come on! Dont tease me, yeah? He winces as I devour it, with tiny nibbles. Winking and licking my claws. Thats the stuff. Hey! Mate, like, cmon! Thats just. Cmon! He sighs. Maaaaateeeee. I lean in to Kami. I dunno. Should we order for him? I mean, he was babysittin. Right? I point at Badger and Tuft. Babysittin these two, to be exact. Hey, like, and everything else! Yeah? He protests. Drone support, overwatch- Uh huh? And what was that about your famed multi-taskin..? I snort. Come on. Ya slipped. Ya let tha squirts escape. Hey, like, come on! Everything was going nuts, and- Mmmmmm.. I gulp, pumping more of that synthetic chocolate-minty goodness into my veins. Sooooo good. Bangles jangle as he throws his arms out. Mate! Come on, theyre - like - the ones who snuck out! How come they get fed!? He slaps his face. Urrgh, fine - like, next time Ill. sit on em or something. Hisssssssss!!!! NUUU!!!! Tufty wails, tail puffing as Badger batts it idly. Slurping that horrific fifty-flavours-of-Hell milkshake. Hey, dont worry squirt! I beam at em. Were starvin Zip up pretty good, so he wont be that heavy! Kami goes rigid, Zip protests - and Badger leaps up. Oooh!! Ill save you half of mine! Promise! Ah, uh. Zips eyes dip toward Badgers waggling drink. Im good mate. Thanks. And it all devolves into rude jokes and nonsense, until. Huh? Are those pasties? Theyre a bit big. Wait, that ones for us? Ahaha! Calzone for you, and for you! Big Tun gushes richly as plates swoop onto our table. I do hope you like them, children! Please let me know if its not exactly right! I take my craft very seriously, you know! And off he toddles again, like some kind of food-based blitzkrieg. So, not pizzas - but kinda? I frown, poking the crispy, bulging, crust with a sceptical fork. Calzone. Zip correct, mournfully. But Big Tuns bombing run aint over yet. Back he scoots with a chunky box stacked with hot, and thickly wrapped, packages. With a special cold section, just for milkshakes and desert. The holos eyes widening. Mate! Hey, this was your horrible idea I smirk as we head for the door. So if we get poisoned, so do you. Outside, Zips bomber drones are already locked into a carrier formation. With escort. And honour guard. Hooking the box up into the swarm - and blasting away. I wave, then bolt back in to crack open that Calzone. Molten cheese and simMeat balls spilling all over my plate. And, damn, if I dont see the appeal. Alright Zip. I grunt, a few forks later. Yave won me over. And so we settle down to pile our bellies full of fat pizzas, desert, and then more desert. And after a while, every bad thing is forgotten. At least by us. Though, I notice, whenever I look up, theres always a stern eye on our table. > > >< < < >> A Voyage Of Lights.... and Dark Delights >> A Voyage Of Lights.... and Dark Delights
Current Funds: 16?
Bellies refilled, milkshakes murdered, and desserts desecrated, we stagger out into the musky-warm dark. Into a world of indoor towers and rattling tramlines - all sprayed with artful, shadowy, colour. With huge bright signs, and inky sellers in eerie masks. Not just for anonymity, either. Gone Wrongs, mutants, synthetics, and thinking monsters shift and slither through the streets. Plying trade, and other things. Fake faces held on by handless fingers, or tendrils of slime. Between them, machine-things clank on metal paws, trailing tails of woven cables - twitching with Tek. Or eyeballs and mouths. We pass a tinkerer stall with armoured walls, loaded down with oddball toys. All tiny robots, aliens, and blaster-rays that really work!. With darts that come back (that sounds. terrifying), and titanium dragons that roar. But next to it, is something fantastical. A glass-fronted stall loaded with little robot animals. Ducks, and snakes, and even.... An iridescent cloud of bright little creatures, all glittering and dizzying about. "Woooow!!!" Badger gasps, flailing about we huddle around. Demon leaning in to sniff the glass, his horns tilting strangely. Tufty tilts his head, curiously. Claws clicking as he does a little hop, trying to catch a blue and gold wonder through the glass. Gosh! Theyre pretty! What.. um.... What are they, though? Butterflies....." I say in a low voice. "Theyre insects. They''re little robots. Kami says in.... not wonder, but well-hidden shock. Kids had these in school. Basic AI. Used to fly them round class when the teacher was out.... We all stop in collective hush. "Uh. Mate..... Remind me again, yeah? Zip hesitates. "Aren''t, like... aren''t you.... from a...." "World Government enclave. Yeah." Her throat works. "Where images of animals are illegal. Yes." She swallows again. "You could get... in a lot of trouble.... having one. " "Dang, girl...." I stumble out. "So..... were.... were they tryin'' to get arrested, or somethin''?" Kami hesitates, a shadow crossing her eyes. And then she speaks a little too slowly, looking away. Yeah. Maybe. Teacher.... used to just take them, though. Didnt even know what they were.. Huuuh? She didnt!? Badger gawps up at the shiny, fluttering, shapes with pure - unshakable - innocence. "But.... Yah! Spook! I thought everyone knew what a butterfly is!! And look! That''s a fox! A real fox! Not a GMO fox! And-" He hesitates. "How come? Why are they banned??? They''re not banned here!" I share a look with Demon. But Kami gets in first. "Because it''s not real." She says in the softest little voice. "None of it is." Badger jerks like he was shot. "What? What''s not real?" His voice is low, too. Quiet. Kami- I warn, but she kneels down to him. Holding his hand, and arm. Animals." She whispers, in a bitter hiss of hurt. "Animals are make-believe. They all are. Theyre all just fables. Like The Surface..... Or The Sky.... The Sun..... Whaaaat??? All of them!?!?" Badger gasps. "But.... but.... He stares to the stall, then at me, then turns to Tufty, and points. "But.... but Tufty''s a cat! And! And!!!" Kami''s braids rattle on hidden armour as her head shakes. "Tufty is a GMO..... He''s special. But...." Her gruff face slips into something softer. "But he''s just.... a modified human. They all are. Just a person made to look like something that doesn''t really exist." "But...." Badger points, miserably. "Butterflies....." Her face dips, and then clenches with resolve. Regret and shame glistening in her eye as she turns away. Look.... It''s just.... mythical crap to con gullible tourists. Okay?" She forces out. "There never were any animals. Not really. It''s all just fairytales for kids." "They''re not." I state. And her head whips to me. Eyes hard, but wet. "If you think that.... you''ve been lied to.. Sorry." She states, like it happened to her too. "I hate this. But he has to know. He has to know it''s not real." But n-no they are!! Theyre real! My dad said- Badger yells at magnificent volume - leaping to touch the glass. But she pulls him away. A flicker of something like fear in her eyes. "Your dad was just being nice..... Im sure. People just pretend because it makes them happ- But-!! He struggles free. But no theyre not! Joan said-!! And! And! Who? Joan! Our dad! OUR REAL DAD!!! He said- Badger blinks furiously. Tufty grabbing his arm, and tugging. Trying to get him away. Kami, drop it. I growl as Demon hoists Badger onto his shoulders, and away. Theyre real enough. Theyre just. gone. What..... She blinks, and hugs herself tight. Did you never get The Talk, or what? Hey, like, chill guys. Yeah? Zip laughs nervously. Kinda making a scene, here, right? And.... yknow.... we''re sorta meant to be hiding? Right? From The-" He stops short of saying ''School''. "-bad guys? Kamis face flickers through a hundred different emotions. And then she folds her metal arms. A shake going through her whole body as she turns dull yes upon me. Prove me wrong, then. She whispers. "Prove me wrong." But I shake my head. Tail lashing. Teeth gritted. Guts cold. Because shes right. I cant. Not. Not anymore. Demon whispers gently to Badger as we leave the dreamlike butterflies behind us, and delve a little deeper. Then deeper still. Into streets hung with lights, and faction flags. With paper lanterns, holos of birds, and golden suns that really glow. The cold in my gut burnt away as we''re immersed in a world of colours and madness. And it isn''t long before the Tufty is being rushed from sweet-truck to toy-stall, on a stream of Badgery babbling. Oooh! Look at that!! Look at that!! Bet I could make that robot shoot LASERS! Oh? This? It already shoots lasers! Chuffles the overtly fuzzy shopkeep, firing off a tiny ray to pop a balloon. BIGGER LASERS! Badger exclaims. And ROCKETS! EXPLODEY ONES!! Ah-ha! I think I may have just- Nooope! I chuckle as Demon escorts our grabby kid away from the tiny murder-bots. But theyre - guided - missiles!! He huffs at large. So I definitely wont make a mess! Cause I''ll only blow up the - right - things! Yeah, right. I snort - whomping him, playfully, with my tail. "Hey''s, damn. Looks like it''s gettin'' late. Time to drag the ''shortie patrol'' to back to bed, I reckon." "BACK!?" Badger gasps in horror. "BED!!?" Zip gives me a virtual thumbs up. "Oh yeah, like better pick up some snacks on the way, yeah? Comms from base says we''re all out." "What?" I balk. "We just bloody stocked up! We got tons of snacks-" "Not any more, mate." Zip snickers. "But....I rub my face. "Oh God damnit. The lil red dustbin strikes again.... She''ll be eatin" the bloody walls next." "Uh, yeah, about that-" Zip snickers. "Nope. Nope. I don''t want to know." I sigh. One hand out, the other cushioning face. "Alright then. Snacks it is..... Better take a left here....." And so, jingling the last of our precious vials, we slip off down a row of originTek shops that drift with ominous antiques. Their windows filled with oddities and unsettling machines - all gauntlets of glossy-black stone, ticking machines, and crystalline armour..... And that''s just the stuff I dare to look at. There''s things, here, so utterly unreal they seem to fuzz the edges of reality around them. Seeping their pulsating Colour across the ground in twisting tendrils and shadows that shift like they''re actually alive. Squirming and swirling around us, as if to grab at our ankles..... But that aint nothing like as scary as the tags in the windows. This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it. Ya gotta pay tsee the prices!? I goggle. How the heck does that work out? Very nicely, I should imagine. States the dead voice in my ear. And we shuffle, quickly, on - just in case they charge ya rent for looking. Dipping out of central Karrak, and into a street where fur-covered full GMOs hawk everything from beads to bazookas. Hawks-heads flogging spae-parts for Synthetics. Synthetics flogging hawk-head eggs, and tiny tape-deck driven robots. Scaled wrathKin hissing prices for bullets and beers... while Gone Wrongs shiver in the dark, right at the edges of our world. All limbs, and ears, and.... I shake my eyes away. They''re people too. They''re just a bit.... Not fun to look at. But soon we find what we''re after, a whole market street - down in the GMO Quarter. The whole place twisting with tails. With sharp eyes, and sharper claws. With bat-creatures that hang from the balconies, hunting for shoplifters. With fox-eared boys barking at cat-kin, and gangs of cobra-kids waving their junior switchblades. More fur. More animal. Way fewer shoes. But plenty of strange and wonderous things for Badger to gawp at. Even things that could pass for a dragon, at a distance. Or maybe even a real animal, if you don''t see the extra eyes. Or fins. Or the way no two are truly alike.... And, way more importantly: full of cakes, bakes, and synthetic snacks laid out on bulging tables. Mounds of creamPuffs. Massive sacks of marshmallows, in fifty different flavours. Boulevards of biscuits. Causeways of candy. Every flavour and type of sweet, dehydrated meal, and hot food cart - ready to go. We slip among them like we belong. Kami folding her arms, to make em more obvious. Badger stuffing his ''cat ears'' back into place, while Tufty perks up - sniffing the air from behind our backs. And Demon.... Demon takes off his mask and hood. Golden bright hair. Handsome, almost human, features - framed by his four horns. And a new, kindled, fire in the square pupils of his glowing golden eyes as we browse amongst bread and pastries. Past entire displays of synthetic simVeg and simMeat (for the traditional). Plus the usual nutriSlop refill bags for food-printing machines. And nutrition pills, for the preppers and the truly desperate. We dig in to browse for deals, careful not to steal amid the sharp senses and shuffling claws. Owl-eye kids tilting their heads on the balconies above, while blue-feathered heron-guards stalk the crowds on legs longer that a man is tall. Glaring down at us with long, hard, beaks set with rows of eerie little eyes. Backed up by dozens of tiny metal turrets, glittering with insectile cameras. But you soon forget em, after a while. Delving through hot trays of baklava, dripping with synthetic honey and butter, fresh from neoTurkey (to the North). Through boxed rows of scones, laden with clotted cream, and synthetic jam from New London (South West). And a side of curry, of course. To say nothing of rarer treats: Artificial spices from Neodine (East). Synthetic herbs, and dried meats of every strange colour. Along with strange, tucked-away, shops selling things that are almost alchemy. All hung with twisted horns, and monstrous spines. All Jabberwock teeth, and Slime Skuller eyes...... But we slip past them all. Down an alley lined with boxes of treats, and bars of chocolate. Pounds of sherbet, and mounds of marshmallow. Gummy worms as tall as you, in great glass jars - and only some still wriggling. The sweet smell of it hits you in a dreamy cloud, and picks my lips with want. There''s a thousand things to grab, and not enough pockets in the world. Or money in ours. But we can breathe it in. Feeding Zipper a wash of sultry, simulated, smells and sights through our implants - as if he were really here with us. Tasting the air for himself. The alleyway winds, and I laugh out loud. "Wow. Hey, hold up a sec! Look at this." I whisper, nudging in the others when Kami ain''t looking. "What, mate......?" Zips eyes light as we crowd around the boxes and boxes brightly colourful chews. "Wow! Like, damn mate! Flavour Cravers! Yeah! I remember these! Wow. Like, we must''ve had these a million times when we were little....." "Flavour Cravers!!" Badger cheers, materialising from nowhere. "YEAH! WOO!! Flavour Cravers!! GET IN MY FACE!!!?" "Heh. Fat chance." I snort. Itching to bop the lil muffin-head. "But come on, d''ya notice anythin'' weird?" "They''re not in my face??" "Besides that, ya dummy!" "What? Weird mate......?" Zip''s avatar wades through the stall to get a closer look, as I grin behind him. "Not really weird, but, like, this really takes me back. Y''know?" The smile turns a little sad, but then brightens. "Oh nice, they got all the best flavours! ''Black Blast''..... ''Zesty Zinger''....." "''Ludicrous Super-Sours''!" Badger pipes, eager fingers twitching. "Yeah, and...." Zipper''s forehead wrinkles like it ate a super-sour. "Wait, like...... the names are wrong?" He starts, as my grin gets wider. "Ludicrous Lemon & Lime?" He lifts a virtual copy of one of the packs. "Black Berry Blast...? Hold on, like are they knockoffs? What the heck is a ''lemon''?" "Some mythical fruit, or something." I scoff in a mockery of Kami''s voice. "But no, they ain''t knockoffs. "They''re the original, censored, versions." I poke a claw at one. "See this? Black Blast is actually Berry Blast. Same exact flavour." My claw shifts. "Same with Ludicrous Lemon. Mango Madness. X-Tream Lychee....." I drop the claw. "Got em all the time, back when I was a shortie." "You were LITTLE!?" Badger yelps as I kick him in the leg. "Yeah, I was squirt. I ain''t proud of it. But the point is, this was my sweet shop. Actual pictures of fruit. Actual names of fruit." I cough. "No actual fruit.... But, point is...." But I hesitate, shifting a pack of Ludicrous Sours cover the happy lemons and limes. "....one day..... they all just vanished. All at once." "Vanished? Mate? What?" "Yep. Every damn one of em. And nobody wanted to talk about it.... Nobody would tell me why....." I choke a swallow. "Then, a few weeks later, they came back. With different packages. Different names. Suddenly it was all ''X-Tream Gushers'' and ''Mystery Madness''. No cartoon fruits at all." I turn a look at him, slowly. "Craziest part is, they shop denied it. Told me I was imagining it. They''d always been like that. Always......" "Seriously, mate?" Zip blinks. "Damn.... Like, I don''t even remember that." "Well, like I said, I was a shortie." I shrug. "Maybe you weren''t there yet." "Then, like, where''d these come from?" He frowns. "How? Like, how''ve I never even heard of it?" "Dunno. New London? I hear they''re all about the stuface stuff....." I drop the little packet. "All I know is, we got told to shut up about it. And we did." Zipper shakes his head, wordlessly. "That''s mad. Like, and to see them right next to each-other. Like...." "Separate products for alternate realities." Injects the ever-watchful Polybius, on our private comms. "One for a world where fruit, officially, ''never existed''. And one for a world where it did." "Yeah." I rub my neck. "Capitalism gonna capital, I guess.... Even when things get weird....." Badger wants to get both of each to ''compare'', but the moment is making my brain itch all over again, and I push him on. It''s not really food, anyways, and the ones with fruit names are pricy due to rarity. But we have a fun browse. Scoping new food, and old. Even actual antique stuff, dug out of ancient vending machines - down, down, down in The Beneath. But when we start browsing biscuits, I finally relent and pick out a couple of packs.
Current Funds: 15.5?
Tufty hops ahead through the maze of claws, and paws, and spidery legs as we pay. Sneaking a peek up at a table stall loaded with simFish and faux Crab. That lil nosie snuffling curiously, under the hair, as he mewls quietly. As if in some primal need. "Eh. May as well get ya something." I mutter as we fall in behind. "No." Growls the richly full-blooded tiger behind it, proudly thrashing his five flowing tails. "What." Kami scoffs. No dirty human monkeys. The full GMO snarls, glaring directly her down with six great ruby eyes. Or their midget spawn. It adds, as Badger pops his head over the counter, paper ear dangling. "What!?" I snap. "Shit, most of us are-" Or dirty half-breed fakes." It sneers at Tufty. Fangs shining as it spits to one side, eyes shifting independently. Or- Shit! Well screw you then! Die poor, ya stripy bastard! We''ll keep our money!" I snap as Demon fights to drag a raging Kami away. Metal fists flailing, and grabbing at air, as the impervious creature smirks behind us. Giving off a little piff. of contempt and folding its four, huge, hairy arms. "Yeah, you laugh. Bet you''re broke as crap too...." "HE''LL EAT CRAP WHEN I''M DONE FEEDING HIM HIS OWN ASS!!!" She screams around the corner, as the tiger-creature flickers a smug little smirk. "YEAH! YOU BETTER STAY THERE! SCARDIE CAT-!" Yahh!! Spook!? Spook!? Badger tugs at my arm. Kamis saying weird stuff again!! Is she really gonna feed him his own ass-? "YOU BET I AM!" "WOW! Can you eat ass??" Badger gives his own a speculative look, like he''s thinking about a lil bite. "Big bloody no to that, kid." I wince. It''s a figure of speech? Or something? Oooooo! A pause. Whats a fig-gure? .Ill. tell yah when Im older. You wont GET any older if you dont LET ME GO!!! Let''s just ignore her..... We delve back into the market, jangling our last vials of Old Blood as we hunt out a deal. Their hardened crystal glittering bright and red in the shifting lights. Each with a tiny, hexagonal, chip shining inside - suspended in liquid. Its clever stuff. Remove the liquid, and the chip instantly fries itself. But you cant really screw with the chip while its wet. So no making copies. Yeah, we tried. We burn it all on basic snacks on a street thick with feathers. Counting out our last, precious, vials into the clawed hands of a tiny little ole rabbit-eared lady. with a big-ass gun, and scary-ass gang tattoos. Who pets Tufty on the head and calls him a sweetie. She was weirdly nice. Set my bells off again, just like with Tun. But I keep it quiet. ....only now were totally broke. And I mean totally. I say, slapping Badgers hands away from the bag. Looks like were gonna have to grab that bounty job.
Current Funds: 0?
From there, we quietly slip back into the treacherous bits of the grand Pirate tower - and the dark closes upon us. Walls of hustling merchants giving way to dens, gangs, and prospective robbers. Beady eyed kids. Vampire-pale addicts. Whole streets taken over by lurid fungal growths, beaten back by guys with blaring flamethrowers. We pass one thats just a carpet of addicts. Then even the people taper off into silence and stillness - stirred only by whispers of wind. And a growing roar of storm. Zip guiding us past buildings with steel-plated doors. Thick as vaults. Residents with cameras and rusty metal dogs. We hurry on. A pimped ganger rig ghosts past us on the way - neon strips transmuting its frame into an empty cage of light. Like something from the Virtual. And then theres nothing for minute after minute. Tick, tick, tick. Its almost a relief when the rumbling bulk of a heavy cleaning drone crosses our path. Thick with turrets and armoured thugs, who hang off the sides. All bearing the branded mark of The Pirate Lords. Just in case you got ideas.. Silence again. Echoing with Kamis boots. The pat of our feet, and clicking claw. The pant of breath, and crinkle of plastic bag. The shiver of a heart, as dread settles in.. And then it gets worse. Total, empty, devastation. Broken houses. Broken furniture. Vacant streets. burnt cars. mutated skeletons. And the ceaseless touch of unseen eyes.. Wish wed saved the tram fare.. I mouth over comms as the streets deafen us with ravenous quiet. Damn, its. desolate. Not even the usual mutant cyborg beggars with guns.. Brr. Gosh, I wish we could park closer. Tufty stammers back, under his breath. Cant. I shake my head, and leave it at that. He knows why we set down out here. Far from the bigger, busier, supposedly safer, hub ports - where every landing is recorded by multiple Pirate Factions. And possibly others.. Maybe even. Them. Sometimes every option is terrible for your health, is what Im saying. But, then again, we never came this way, going in.. Hey, yknow- Zip starts up over comms, just to break the harsh and. twitchy. silence. But then he cuts himself off. Wait! Like, uh. hold on a second. Instantly, my ears swivel. What? All I hear is. Engines..? Theyre faint. An undercurrent to the endless wind. As if theyre really far away, or. dampened. My ears flick the other way, my tail beginning a slow sweep. Heartbeats pass. My hackles prick. I glance at the others, and we all spread out more. Checking guns. Scoping boarded shopfronts. An icy thought entering my mind. What if we hid the chopper, but exposed ourselves? And then. Mate, uh, dont freak. Zip hesitates, a wide look in his eyes. .but. you got hostiles incoming. Looks like youre being hunted.. > > >< < < >> Battle Mode :: Engaged >> Battle Mode :: Engaged
LOADOUT - SPOOK
Armour :: LMG ''Dominion 5'' Exoskeleton
WEAPONS
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 220/220 Mode :: [Burst] Alt Fire :: [Full Auto] Spare Mags :: 3/4
LMG Executioner Pistol :: 14/14 Mode :: [Single Shot] Spare Mags :: 3/3
LMG Issue Combat Knife
GRENADES
  • 2x Frag - Explosive, Concussive
  • 2x Stun Powder - Paralytic
  • 2x ''Destroyer'' - Coded Annihilator Field
  • 1x Sensor Blocker
OTHER KIT
  • Field Medic Satchel (Basic)
  • Infiltrator Toolkit (Basic)
  • 3x Mini Flares
Combat narrows your focus to a lasers edge. The world evaporates. Theres only the fight. Theres only the now. The instant. The hammer of Kamis boots. The clack of claws, and whisper of pads - tails streaking, as we run. Zipper screaming SHIT! SPOOK! Like, go! Go! Youre being flanked! as his squadrons blast past overhead. Hes already fully engaged - buying us time. I flick my mini-map, and it expands into a full vScreen. Dozens of red dots crawling along a street parallel to our own. Vid-feeds unfurl beside it as we run. A dozen blurring angles of chaos, smoke, and flashes of light. Rocket-bullets streaking past Zips drones as darts of light. Screams and blasts of scrambled imagery. All while the street whirls around me. Into cover. Dive right out. Cross over here. Cross over there. Minimise exposure. Maximise awareness. Twitch your gun at every shadow. Thats what combat really is. What you remember it as. Just pure confusion, light, shouting, and noise. Your mind locking down into a tunnel. A narrow path from cover, to cover, as you bolt between wrecks. Scrabbling over the rubble of collapsed buildings. Ever second another heartbeat, slamming in your chest. Ears flicking circles - like radar. Forward, left, right, and back. Turning in to the distant pop and whistle of bullets. To the enemies Zip sees, and the ones he dont. I aint sure when we ditched the food. Or where. Or if we thought we were coming back. Just that, suddenly, nothing matters but getting the Hell outta there. That Zip is screaming directions, and we dont stop to argue. Not even Badger, now hanging to Demons horns - riding his back as we bolt on all fours. Zip! I yell. What the Hell is this? Gangs? I dunno!!!! I dunno! They just- Think, like, t-they were following us! Shit! Shit! I turn a corner, then another - hoping to throw em. But too little too late. Damnit! How did they bloody track us?? I knew Moon would bloody- INCOMING, MATE!!! HUGE DRONE SQUADRON!" He screams in breathless panic. "AND, GOT, LIKE. FOUR-FIVE GUYS WITH GUNS! HEADING YOUR WAY!!!! LIKE, RIGHT NOW!! SHIT!!! THERE''S MORE! I CANT STOP THEM!!! THEY GOT AN ARMY! MOVE!!! I roar as a pack of cheap little twin-rotor drones go screaming overhead - trading gunfire with Zipper. Two zero-in on Demon, and he pulls Badger under him as they fire. Shielding the kid with his body. I spin out between two broken cars, and feed the bastards all four barrels of my SMG. Their deaths are instant. Thats the beauty of high rate of fire - I barely have to aim. I just wrench back that trigger, and mow em down. Fire exploding from vents in the sides of my gun ignites a screaming swarm of small-calibre death. Rocket-bullets punching holes in their thin shells. Bouncing around inside. Mangling electronics. Servos. Everything. Drones spiral - one crashing into a wall. Others into the ground, or bouncing off cars. Spinning down to their demise as smoke pours from their engines. Kami nudging round cover to support me - laying on a storm of pistol-fire from all six guns. Her punching neat holes in the swarm, as I chew through the masses. Demolishing half the force in three or four seconds. And I think we''ll hold it. I''m sure we will. Right until my quad-mag clicks dry. "Reloading!" I yelp over comms, spinning back into cover to eject it. Slapping it to my armour, where it sticks, and ramming home a new one. Only two left - I better conserve. I jab a claw into the mini menu floating above the ammo-counter, and the gun flips to what I call ''Swarm Mode''. That sets the main, rear, trigger to deal out [Short Burst]s, and the front, alt-fire, trigger to [Shotgun Mode].
Settings :: Short Burst Fires all four SMG barrels every time the trigger is pulled.
Settings :: Shotgun Mode Fire all four barrels, simultaneously.
I spin back out, and restart my rampage. Dropping drones, left and right - fast as I can pull the trigger. Heat and flame blasting from my gun as I break their formation. Murdering multiple drones per shot. Together, we tear them down. Five shots. Six. Seven.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 192/220 Spare Mags :: 2/4
"THEY''RE FLANKING!!" Kami scream, and I track my shots round to blast em away. Eight. Nine- My gun goes suddenly wild - a double burst - then jams utterly solid. Pumping smoke and sparks from its vents like a furious dragon. Shit! Shit! Clearing jam! I scream, diving back into cover as it hisses madly. Multiple bullets ignited, but stuck in the weapon''s crucible. No time to get fancy - I shove the gun in a hole as Kami covers me. Slapping it. Hard. Like it owes me money. Inbuilt diagnostic systems flare the standard, red, OK! symbol every LMG gun is stuck on. But then they suddenly glitch. Overridden by a triangle built of eyes and clockwork. Sudden, fresh, messages flooding the corner of my vision:
Condition :: Gun Jam - Red Glory SMG Common - Mechanical/Software Rocket bullets are caseless. Therefore all LMG rocket-guns rely on internal gripper nodes to restrain bullets as they are ignited. During a burst, or rapid fire, these can become mistimed; causing a jam. Known Fixes: Clear Jam to cause [Soft Reset].
ERROR :: Burst Overrun - Red Glory SMG Common - Electronic Details: [Short Burst] mode fires 4x bullets per trigger pull. However, it can trigger multiple times due to a faulty switch. This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there. Known Fixes: Replace or Mod Trigger Switch. [Hard Reset] rumoured to help,
Pol, ya dumb metal asshole! I got no time to read that! I smack the gun again. Any level of readings too much in combat. No time to get fancy. I yank my pistol and charge after the other - dipping in and out of cover. Then, when it''s clear enough, I burrow behind a car - unhooking the mag on my SMG, and snapping it to my armour. HURRY! Kami screams as they herd the shorties onward. Tufty bounding and skittering on all fours - over a rough pile of bricks, then under a truck. I pinch both sides of my barrel array - depressing stiff switches - and the whole thing slides off. It''s basically just four plastic tubes welded together. The top two a bullet-length longer, to account for the quad-barrel design. And, currently, still smoking. Cursing, I flip it to shake out the bullets. A dangerous bloody move, pointing lit bullets at your face. I''ve heard stories. But this is a dangerous bloody place, and I got no time - so I swing it wild. An unfired round spilling out into the mess, and rolling under a car. Forget it. But there''s one more. I peer down the safe end - and there it is. Top right chamber. Too late. Second wave!! SECOND WAVE! Kami screams as I abandon cover, charging right after Tufty. Half a gun in one hand, a pistol in the other. Raw brick skitters beneath me - banging my armoured elbow. Were getting bloody swarmed - which pressures Zipper to help. Which shunts his battle toward us - giving their main force freedom to move. Shiiit.. The barrel ''magnetises'' to my armour, and I blur after my crew. Right to the end of the street. Look left. Right. Then run like Hell, cause here the bastards come. Zooming from wreck to wreck as they track us down the street. And what a bloody mess we''re in, here. Two of us unarmoured. Me with my gun in bits. Holy crap. Echoed nightmares ring though my skull - bullets drilling soft, tender, flesh. Maybe Badger. Maybe Tufty. The kind of horror every warrier gets - where everyone you love is somehow right in the fire-line. It dont matter. Not now. I follow Demon as he blasts his SMG to give buy me time. Enough to stop behind a car. Jam a thin tool in the awkward breach of my gun, and hammer-through the still-smoking bullet. Then shove the damn barrels back on their rail, as my whole team screams at me. Launching into a run, even as I snap it home. Hold on!
## Soft Reset :: [Activated] ## .. ## Recalibrating :: [Crucible Nodes] ## . ## DONE
Internal panels click and reset. Capacitors humming as it attempts to fire the last round in that [Short Burst] sequence. Then two [Short Bursts] more. It gives up, I slam the mag back in the base - and my HUD reignites over the gun. Complete with standard counting error.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 220/220 Mode :: [Short Burst] Spare Mags :: 2/4
Wrong. It''s 184, but the gun reset the counter. A shudder shakes through me as I run - shadows of The School boiling up in my skull. Of dark punishments for hording and ''stealing'' things that never existed..... I jam it back in the box and run, as more drones come spinning past. Badger hurling little balls behind us that burst with a CRACK and a noxious green WOOSH of smoke. Blotting the drones. Confusing the battle. I spin sideways, and fire as another drone strafes us. I kill their leader, but there''s more. Dozens. Every one ejecting a bomb-load of rocket-rounds that snap across our flank. Cracking brick. Hammering metal. Splattering blue gunk. But not penetrating. Not my armour. Not the cars. Not anything. SOFTNOSE BULLETS! I scream in utter dismay, as our implants flag the fallen rounds. ITS A CAPTURE OP!!! "SHIT!" Kami roars. "RUN!" I snap my gun to my chest, drop to all fours, and utterly book it. Chasing a stumbling Badger ahead of me. Demon grabs him again, and we fly across rubble. Jumping cars. Ripping around fallen buildings and a burst-open bandstand. Each and every one of us locked in a sudden, fatal, panic that could cost us our lives. Getting killed is one thing. But captured? That can only mean one thing, and it scares me more than a bullet through the skull. Because the only monsters that want us alive..... .....are The School. And what they want us for. Its way worse than anything you can picture. So we absolutely pelt it. Ignoring cover. Letting the bullets smash off armour like tiny stones. One erupts by my face, spatting my hand with numbing shards of blue gel. SPOOK! MATE! YOURE CUT OFF!! Zipper screams over comms, not bothering one dick of an instant with that avatar. AMBUSH AHEAD! LIKE, HALF THEIR FORCES!!? MORE!!? SHIT! COVER! COVER! I roar as more drones come racing down the street. All cheapo twin-rotors. But theyre everywhere. And theyre spitting tiny specks of bright blue at my face. Like mil-spec paintball rounds. THROUGH THE BUILDINGS! Kami yells back, and - holy shit - shes got a point. Enough explosives, and there aint no such thing as trapped. And, thanks to Badger, we got plenty. ....except.... As Zip''s scout-drones cross the rooftops, I can already see the enemy troops rushing to cut us off. "Shit! We''re gonna be trapped!" Kami screams, and I see the whole battle play out in my head. Us running. Them chasing. Right back to the landing bay. And then we''ll be stuck. Pinned down in our own escape vehicle. More guns, yes, but totally imobile while I prep to take off. We can''t get away. We''re going to have to fight. Split up!! Get inside! Use the buildings for cover! We''re gonna have to fight this! I yell, slamming on my mag extension. I shove the others into a run, even as it ratchets into place. Numbers flickering on my HUD.
Ammo :: 432/440 (Extended) Spare Mags :: 1/4
Kami hurls her cloak to Demon - tiny halos blazing against her body, like targets, as she darts away. I grab Badger and charge the buildings. The kid all panting, and wide-eyed with excitement. Like its all a cartoon to him. Tufty tries to follow - but I cant shield em both. "JUST FIND A WAY THROUGH! ANY WAY YOU CAN!" I jab him at Demon, who takes a flying leap onto a huge pile of rubble. Then up - into an empty second-floor window, shielded by a massive fallen wall. Not something Badger can do. Tufty yelps in terror, hops from foot to foot - then bounces up after, into the window. Claws scrabble, tail waggles, and hes barely gone before less lethal gunfire rips across the busted pavement where he stood. Battering off it, and right at my face. Panic roars, and I hurl Badger toward the ancient shopfronts. Three to choose from - all wide open windows. One collapsed. One blown open. One choked and barricaded with furniture - all chewed up with bullets. Good enough. I charge through the open door as rocket-rounds rain. Somehow Badger clung to my chest - and I leap to the side. Landing on ruined tiles and shattered glass cubes. Bullets roar though the bust-open door, and I wince back. Bouncing, heavily, onto the long counter as a drone skims in behind. Slamming bullets off my back. For a split-second I eye the cluttered mass of tables jamming the rear exit. All broken and tumbled. Scattered with bones. Shiiiit. Nonononono- The twin-rotor bastards come screaming in after us - forcing me to drop behind the mangled coffee-bar. To ram Badger under the counter - so hard my gun bangs his knee, making him cry. Right as they fire again - wood-effect plastic cracking and splitting beneath hammer-blow rounds. More raining Hell and fury across the dead caf. Mashing old pictures. Puffing bits of floor into the air. Pulping skeletons - as if they hadnt suffered enough. Old walls shuddering as the gel-tips bounce, re-wrecking the whole inside. Thunder, smoke, and threads of corkscrew fire blasting off the top of our shelter. It stops, fast as it began - drones barely carry ammo. But theyre disposable, and they come spinning over the top of the bar. Forcing me to wedge Badger tighter as my SMG roars. Bullets pelting. Drones shattering, and tumbling to the ground. Blades snapping as they hit the floor in jerks. I stand, and twist. Ripping through drones as they spit in the door. If it were just me, Id tank it - but Badger? Without armour? In this? That gel that spreads the impact, but Softnoses still got killing force. A shot to the skull can shatter bone. The eye? Don''t ask. And Badger....? Itd mash his insides. So I fight.
Ammo :: 374/440 (Extended) Spare Mags :: 1/4
Shit! Polybius! Track my damn ammo! I scream, and reality fuzzes around the gun. A secondary, triangular, counter blocking out the bad one. I fire again, even as it does.
Ammo :: 338/440 (Extended) Spare Mags :: 1/4
That aint quite such a happy bloody number - but truth is better than lies any day. I curse the damn drones, and the damn School, and the fact the front door is busted. No way can I keep this up. Two-and-a-bit mags, and Ill be down to grenades - which aint so friendly for me, up close. But the drones are petering off, so I point my fist at the pile of crap blocking our exit. Firing a tiny robotic bolt, trailing a micro-fine grappling wire. It sticks the plastic, and unfolds prongs - stabbing em deep into plastic, and rooting to it with nano-fiber spikes. One big-ass tug, and the whole thing topples in a mad avalanche of stuff. Another, and I''ve got a damn shield. I slam it into the door-frame, then unhook the grapple. Hurling lightweight tables at the entry, until I''ve piled em deep enough to block out the filers. Clearing a mangled, private, doorway. I got an exit! Im okay! But what the bloody Hells going on? Mate, I got no clue- Za- Demon starts. "Oh, you''ll bloody see...." Kami snarls, jolting me with adrenaline. SPOOK- Badger yells, but I ignore him. Flipping open Zips camera feed - which unfurls a mass of virtual screens, all round me. Every one em showing what absolute shit were in. Im talking twenty or thirty aerial bots per one of Zippers. Slower ones. Cheaper ones. But just.... so many. And there''s even more on the ground. Junker bots. Things with bladed arms. Drone launchers. Plus several, massive, trucks unloading guys with guns. Kids too. Its a freaking invasion. I whisper, catching Kamis fuzzy blue outline on a speeding drone. Her invisible leg hooked over the sill - with the blocky end of her massive rifle jutting down the street. Barrel extension on. One boot wedged up on the brick, the other dangling. Theres a tiny second of pause, and then- BOOM. > > >< < < >> Murder OClock >> Murder O''clock The whole street rolls with the brutal, sparking, retort of an overcharged railgun. Kami''s avatar framed, in stark radiance, on my vScreen. Blooms of fire and hate blazing from the sides of her massive anti-materials rifle. Erupting from the muzzle, in a star of death. The shot is instant. Electrical boosters accelerating the round beyond anything my gun can do. Once second, nothing. The next - a corkscrew trail of smoke, sparks, and violence as she rams a 88 calibre rocket down the entire length of the street. Trailing a helix of smoke and flame, all the way to the enemys real line. Instantly, Zips cameras jump. Focusing in on their forces. A line of crude tank-drones, backed by three slickly armoured drone motherships designed to look like package-drone carriers. Clever camouflage. Except for the fist-thick hole punched right into the leaders nose. Pouring smoke and- The drone carrier unravels in a colossal explosion of raw - white - plasma tinged purple, and blue. Piled tables shuddering loose in my caf as the shockwave cracks against the walls of the buildings. Hammering my ears with a thunder that rivals the gun itself. In half an instant, the slick carrier is a burning shell of dripping plastic. Crashing out of the air with a thunderous SMACK of metal on brick. And then, the fuel cells go nova. One by one. A series of bangs and roars that turn black walls blue with light. Shrapnel biting massive chunks from the carriers that flank it. Silence. Sudden silence. Every drone just stopped in the air. As if nobody can believe it. Can deal with it. Every enemy, and friendly, and idiot onlooker briefly united as one. Rethinking the lines of the battle. And then their entire freakin force locks onto the smoke-trail. Spinning to hit Kamis window, en mass. She panic-rolls back into the building as brickwork is chewed to shreds by the roar of hundreds of gyrojet bullets. So many the gel-tips hit like a storm of sledgehammers. Bouncing off crumbling mortar to flow in every direction. And then it stops, just as quick. TRAITORS! BETRAYERS! RENEGADE TRAINEES! A loudspeaker screams - flattening my poor ears even harder. WE ARE THE THIRD WAYMAN COMPANY!! ACTING ON BEHALF OF YOUR TRUE OWNERS!!! THE NEO-SOVIET EMPIRE!! Shit! Pirate mercs! I growl in near relief. At least it aint The LMG. Or The NKVD. Wed be absolutely hosed. BE WARNED! WE DO NOT NEED TO TAKE YOU ALIVE! HOWEVER - IF YOU SURRENDER IMMEDIATELY, NO HARM WILL COME TO YOU! SO DROP YOUR WEAPONS, AND LIE FLAT ON YOUR FACES! HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEADS! FAILURE TO DO SO WILL- The voice ends in a scream as Kami fires again. No railgun boom this time - it hasnt recharged. Just a fwoosh of the rocket, and a massive bloom of magnesium fire as the shot bursts against the surface of another mothership. Filling the darkened road with light. Nowhere near the punch to penetrate - but by the screams, she crisped their bloody britches. And thats when the real fight begins. Swarms of drones scream past at full-attack speed - bombarding her new window, my shop, and the street with pale gas and tiny missiles. Blasting holes in our cover. I swear like shit, and slap my breather on. I gotta get Badger outta here now. That could be teargas, or it could be Hexo - a popular-as-crap Pirate knockout gas. Either way, our shelter wont last - not with tiny, vicious, missiles pumping in every direction. One hits my barricades, and blows em apart. Ripping the table a new one, and starting the collapse. I hurl Badger away as golf-ball orbs smash through the gap. Pulsing a flashbang roar of white light, and deafening noise - over and over. Forcing us to shut off normal vision and hearing - flipping to heat sensors. The world turns to flame and ice and silence as I pull him over the mass of furniture, toward the back. Those nasty little orbs rendered down to hot little dots that I kick away. "Thank bloody God it werent frags." Spook! Mate! You gotta get outta there! Zip screams over comms - the only thing I can hear. But where? All I got is a busted little hallway, a collapsed stairwell, going up, and a ruined prep-room. The ruined plastic shell of a worker-bot hanging, quietly, from a rail above it. Bleeding wires, like guts and blood. I duck it, dragging Badger to a door buried behind crumbling crates and metal tables. The little guy hopping and waggling his arms at me. Little more than a heat-smear of colour, miming a huge - undoubtedly awesome - explosion. We aint blowing the bloody door off. I growl, planting a foot on the wall to shift the cool blue table. Walls shaking as I toss crumbling boxes behind me. The back door jerks as I slam my shoulder into it. Wrenching it. Hammering it open, bit by bit, then turning to jam it shut. Resetting my vision and ears as I cut off the light-show. YEEEE!!! SPOOK! THAT WAS AWESOME!!!! LOOK!! I GOT ONE!!! Badger yells, waggling a flasher grenade - which cheerfully strobes me in the face. I yelp, and swat it away. Which just makes things way worse, until I grab it again and chuck it back out - taking a fast look round. Good thing bionic eyes and ears dont really get blinded. Spook!? Spook!? You there!? Kami calls. Im stuck!! Need backup!! Drones bloody everywhere! Where are you? My eyes whirr as they adjust to the dim light. Brick and cables flicking into focus. Flicking across raided crates, and gutted delivery systems. A huge pipe dripping rusty water into a massive gaping hole in the floor. A vast, dark pit that- I snap my eyes away from it, and slam my back into the door. Shuddering deeply. Out the back! In some drone delivery bay behind the shops! I yell over the muffled roar of Armageddon. Ya need savin? Hell no! She scorns, but I know its a lie. I need bloody backup. Crap! I shift against the wall - pressing back from that vast, hollow, mouth. For a single, mad, second I imagine running back out - gunfire be damned. Anything but that pit. But I''ve got to be firm. For the team. Zip! You''re on damage control! Get em off her somehow! Kami - find their damn commanders! And keep hittin'' big-ass targets! Demon! Hide Tufty, n'' go distract em! I''m gettin'' round their back! Gonna sabotage their shit! I need ya to back me up!" This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. Copy that mate! "Right, sure, whatever." Zha. Is all Demon adds says. And I know he will. Um...... I dunno if I should..... Our cat breaks in, suddenly. Fretfully. Like he''s expecting a smack. Theres ah., um.? Spit it out, Tuft! I groan. "Spook don''t listen. Its more of his games." Kami snaps. "Kami. Shut it. Not now." But she flicks up on my vScreens, rifle held ready. "Spook. Listen. He plays at being all bloody harmless. But it''s a game. He''s trying to get you killed. He''s betrayed us before. He betrayed everyone. You know this. It''s a trap." I freeze, cold emotion carving deep into my belly. "You''re wrong. I grew up with him. I-" "I know what I saw." "You saw noth-" I choke the words off. "No time. Can''t do this now. I''m gonna hear ''im out. And that''s final." "Spook...." She pleads. Pain in her voice. "He''ll get you killed. And...." "Well.... If he does.... we''ll all bloody know, won''t we?" I snap her feed off. "Tufty. You got your chance. Prove you''re on our side." The kid hesitates. Like he''s afraid. Or doing a damn good job pretending. "O-okay...." He whispers. "You s-said to find their, um, their..... um..... you know?" "Commanders?" I frown, flicking open Demon''s armour camera to reveal our nervous green feline. Ears flat. One hand over his fringe as he hunkers, and shivers. Looks like a barricade behind a fallen roof "Well, theres sort-of maybe a big truck, right behind their. um. The back? He pings my map, with a shaky claw, and I zoom in on a spot right behind their lines. Just round the back of the last house. There? I frown, suddenly freezing. Ears perked." You sure it ain''t a troop carrier? Ah! No! Its, um, its pretty small?? I um. Its got antenna.." He holds out an image, and I grab it through the screen. And you think it''s their command? I blink. Holy shit. If you''re right...." "Spook. Listen. Please. That''s way too convenient." Kami snarls. "Why would-" "Kami. Shut it. I''m gona look into it." I snap. Turning back to Tufty, who looks away. A quick flash of anger twitching his doll-like face. "Anything else? Gosh, um, m-maybe.? Maybe.... But...." He wilts, shakily. Like he''s totally spent. "Im sorry. I cant. I..... Good enough. I growl, shaking my head. "Kami. Can ya blast the truck? "I''m down to my last guided bullet." She snaps, firing at something with her pistols. "If I aim wide, sure, maybe, I can-" the muzzle flares. "-bend the bullet right round that corner ..... But i need the exact coordinates." "Tufty? Did ya paint a target on the van? " "Um..... n-n-no.... I''m sorry.... I can''t...." He whispers. "I d-don''t have my helmet. Just my map and.... " "Demon?" "Kah. No." He says, nuetrally. "Zey saw us. Zait window.... Is gone. Zait house...." "Shit.... Zip! Can you bomb it? Or get her a target?" "Mate, like, I dunno if you noticed but... Like I ain''t winning out here. I got ten missiles left. But I''m, like, trapped in the middle. If I push-" "Shit." I whisper. "That''s it then. I''ll have to sneak past." "Then no, Spook! I''m not doing it! We get out some other way! Meet up lat-" Kami yelps, firing wildly. -piss off! Piss off! You little drones! Im-" She dives back into cover, panting hard. "Spook! Please listen! He''s sending you to your death! Can''t you see it?? And I can''t bloody help! I''m stuck in a bloody hole! She shoots back." Just.... just- I cut her feed. Shaking. "She means well, mate." Zip starts. "Later. No time for drama. I gotta paint that damn target. " I start to shift along the wall, then jerk. Wait. Tufty. Whatdya mean maybe? He means totally-definitely! Badger chimes, making ready to hurl a huge box into that void. Badger. Get down. I turn to Tuftys screen - tears streaking a wild green eye, framed by fringe. The other side, dry. Cold. Hidden by green. What dya mean? Did ya see somethin'' else? Um.. He looks away. All the s-soldiers have c-collars. And- Collars!? I rock back, jamming a hand into the screen to grab the photo hes holding. Its a dirty, tattered, man who looks absolutely terrified. Basic basaltic armour. No helmet. Crude, bulky, explosive collar. Holy shit. Thats a slave. I realise. What!? Say again, mate? Im- Theyre all frickin slaves n drones! I yell in sudden relaisation. New bloody orders! Ignore the troops! Target the command! Its top heavy! Take out the leader, and the whole show implodes! Got it mate! But, like, its crazy over their- Do it! Anything you can! I yell back. Forcing down my phobia with a snarl of direction. Of purpose. We can win this! Lets bloody go! And I start pushing myself along the wall. Im here Spook! Ill help! Badger gushes proudly, grabbing my hand and beaming. I jerk mine away so fast I almost claw him. But he doesnt lose his sparkle. Its okay! Just follow meee!! Were goin this way. I point. We need to get behind their damn lines. My lips tighten in something like a grin. And then. Then were gonna make em wish were the cute lil kids they think we are. Groping fingers and searching soles find me a doorway. Plastic, with a cool metal strip. Another shop. Z-pook? ZPOOK! Zis is getting- Demon roars in panic, and I curse myself. Yelling orders. Directions. Ive gotta act fast, or friends are gonna die. I get to the last shop, and rip the door open. Nice of the Pirate Scum tsteal the locks.. I grin, whispering in through another wrecked stockroom. Long metal racks, this time, like youd line up with hangers. Beyond it, another tiny hallway. Then Im out, into a dank maze graffitied dummies - all with Xd out eyes. Bullet-holes carved in plastic flesh. My eyes slip round the shop. Picked clean. Unless you count training dummies. Spook! Shit! Im down half my drones! Were gonna- Static. Explosions. SPOOK!! I got ya! Shit! Check my status! He yells, trailing off as the battle convulse outside. Flashes of light and streaks of darting colour through the busted windows. Utter mayhem. Okay, like, I got one big strike left. Then thats it. Alright? Totally out, til I reload! Shiiit. I groan. Can you hit their command? Or somethin major up this end? Keep em occupied? Ill try, like, but theyre all ov- He curses and the whole megaTower shudders. I freeze, stopped at the cusp of the shop. And then I jump as a small hand grabs my tail. Wait here! Stay silent! Okay? I hiss as Badger opens his big gob. Noo! Shhhhhh! Stay! And get in the back, where they cant see ya! But- But I can help!! He whispers up at me with big watery eyes, fingering some kinda tube with wires and. Shit, how did ya get- Is that the pipe-bomb? The one I took of ya?? I groan into a hand. No! No! Give it here! Just get your ass ta cover, n stay there! But-! Now, Badger!! I insist, snatching it and slipping toward missing front door. Looks like the fight out there has really rearranged the general street-wreckage. .and now some of its on fire. Awesome. I adjust the breather under my helmet, then stick my gun-cam out the missing door of the shop. Panning this way and that. My Dominion 5 armour aint exactly stealth-grade, but its fuzzy to heat and magnetic sensors. Especially crappy ones. Im nowhere near invisible, but. No. Cant wait. This is getting worse by the second. I step out, slipping to the edge of a broken Drone Mothership. Its gleaming surface wracked with holes. Mostly from above. The ground around it littered with jittering drones. Dead. Disconnected. Dying. Disconnected.. The drones are the main force, and were outnumbered. My eyes slip to one of the last remaining Carriers. Its smoothed shape slipping across the rubble, a foot from the surface. Both sides open, as rotor-drones buzz in and out. Settling. Reloading. Repaired by tiny arms. Then sent back into the world to wreck havoc on us. Damn things. If only it werent guarded. If only I could reach out and.. My eyes widen. Shit. Weve been goin about this all wrong. Zipo! Hit the targets I designate! I need a distraction! Im about to turn this whole bloody fight around! And, with that, I whisper out into the mayhem. Right as Zippers drones re-enact the end of the freakin world.. > > >< < < >> Hostile Ground >> Hostile Ground
Objectives: 1) Sneak into [Hostile Area]. 2) Confirm intel. 3) Paint a [Sniper] target on the [Mobile Enemy Command Centre]. Bonus Objectives: 1) Survive. (Optional)
Micro-missiles streak into the cloud of drones, and the world goes nova. Detonating in a wave of scalding fire that cleanses the air above. The ceiling itself flashing red as blood, then scalding white-hot - tinged with blue. The classic double-explosion of PX-9 Incendiaries. A burst of flammable gas, chased by a massive heat-ignition that sucks all the oxygen from the air. Drones tumbling from an indoor-sky that stinks of burnt explosives. Burnt plastic. Burnt rubble. Even through my breather. No burnt people, yet. But well see how we go. Stored oxygen floods my mask as the slaves choke and run. Falling back as far as they dare. Clearing the front and mid lines, as I sneak in behind a car. A twist in my gut, but.. maybe. maybe this is how we save them. Good work, Zip. Nice chaos. Theyre not equipped for this. Shit, mate. Like, I didnt get em r-right? Like, I scared them off. but. Nah. Not that I see. I scan the field. Fighting down the ghastly, inner, echoes of my training. The whispered memory of Moon, telling me I missed. Right. Headin for the command post. Kami, get ready. I whisper, ducking deeper into the street. Off the pavement, onto tarmac. Bounding over scorched drones. Spook.. Please. She begs again. Prepare the shot! I repeat. Zip! Ya got anythin left? Nah, mate! Thats it! Like, Im out of the game here! He yells as I flicker across the rubble. Under a broken truck. Round the belly of that fallen Drone Carrier. Im low, too. Kami warns. A few explosive rounds. One. She hesitates. One or two guided. But Im out of plasma. Low on pistols. Grenades are fine though. Demon. There comes a dark, bubbling, growl no truly human throat could make. Zay cannot disarm me. He states with blood in his voice. By forcing me to shoot zem. I almost stumble. Uh oh. Good. Great. I stutter back, darting toward the nearest of the downed Carriers. Zip. Just keep distractin the drones, best ya can! Demon, I need backup. Is Tufty safe? Kah! No! Zey have- Please. Get him safe. Fast. Safe being code for cuff him to something. Spook. If he gets loose. Itll be bloody fine. Damnit. He aint gonna do nothin. I yell back, pissed off. Kami was the one who insisted on the lockups. If I had my way. Demon, get ready. I need ya on backup. Badgers icon lights up. No, kid. No armour, no go. Stay back. I take a breath, back a dozen more orders, then nod. Right. Thats everythin. This is it, so lets go. Gotcha mate! But I can- Mew.. Whatever. Your funeral. Zha. It will be done. I jolt round the fallen Carrier, using my guns camera to scope it. The ground around it carpeted with dead & dying drones. Lights flickering. Rotor clicking. Guns twitching. I duck back as rockets spit at me. Swearing. I step backwards, slightly, to give myself room. Then flip my SMG round the rear of the Carrier - hammering a couple of quad-shots into the downed bots. I duck back. Check my oxygen. Then slip out, with furtive eyes, to pry open the Carriers service panel. Tapping the shattered innards. Yeah, thats dead. Crap. A stifled sob stops me, and I jerk. Ducking into cover. Breathing slow, and quiet, as I peer around the bulk of the Carrier. Its one of the slave-men, face down. He aint a pretty face. He aint anything to look at. Square, shaved, head - rough with stubble. Blood and tears down his soot-blackened cheeks. Biting his thumb. Clutching the ground.. My eyes slide lower, guts clamping. His legs are. trapped under the fallen drone. We did this. We did. My eyes shift again, and meet his - this unwilling enemy. I cant even see a gun. Or armour. But that dont mean hes not about to kill. His hand reaching for me. Desperate. Like a child. I take half a step, and his collar bleeps red. Tiny camera swivelling to stare at me. Words on his lips, that just wont come. No. I bite my lip. Ive got tools. Disarming tools. But I aint an expert, and- The bleeping hits a frantic pace. I run. The bang behind me, sharp and cold. Like a ten ton guillotine burying itself in the bedrock. I keep running. Shaken, but hardening. These bastards.. Wayman Company. They got a lot to answer for. And Im about ready to ask. I reach the second Carrier wreck as Zippers drones come screaming past - chased by the slow, awkward, twin-rotors. Hes fast. Hes agile. But theres only so much ammo. Only so much you can dodge. And hes been spending jets to keep em off us. Weaving the massed forces of the enemy. Plunging through swarms so deep that even the tightest turns can only trade fire for fire. How do they have so bloody much? I skulk my gun round the belly of Carrier no 2. This one fell sideways, and toppled - still smoking. Drones wheeling around it, like monsters in The Deeps. I gotta keep low. Trust the gunk, the wreck, and the sensor-blurring haze of my armour.. But Zip and Kami are too bloody good at their job. All I find is a cut hand, and dead wires. The screen dark. Systems offline. I wrap the cut, fast, and skulk away. Its gonna be the live one, then. The run-up to that is a winding maze of dead cars, live bots, and reluctant soldiers. Some grimly steady. Others - mainly kids - hugging their guns like blankies. Damnit.. Defenders and hostages, in one neat package. My implant tracks across it - highlighting cover, hiding places, and lines of sight. I zero it on the last two, and hit the manual eject on my mag-extension. Barely anything in it, anyway - itll just get in the way. I lock the SMG to my armour, them pull my pistol. Snapping it to my shoulder - where it sticks. Right in easy grabbing range. I hope I dont gotta. I really do. This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. These kids. Theyre a shadow in the mirror - a glimpse of what we were, barely two months ago. I still feel the collar. A deep breath, and I drop to all fours. Low and fast, as I slip through that maze of smoke and mayhem. Dark plastic armour, and grey cloak, blending with scorched rubble and brick. I hunker low. Dodging jagged flowers of shrapnel vicious enough to cleave flesh and light armour. Got little enemy tank drones everywhere. Spiders too. All under cars, zooming into the less-busted shops. Rotor-drones whirling the smoke in spirals as they dart about the upper windows. Orange ghosts in the colourful, rancid, fog. Organised. But not a pro-level op. I mutter. It seems fairly typical of Pirate shenanigans. My ammo-counter notes, flicking up a detailed map of the battle so far. Replaying it at 3x speed. Notice: the flank-and-ambush tactic was opportunistic. It slowed them down. It narrates as clumps of orange dots break away from the main mass, rushing up parallel streets to block us. You could have escaped, if you had fallen back faster - under fire. Thought they was real bullets. I state, as Polybius examines me from my own gun. You only, truly, engaged when this fight began to mirror the one with Moon. I ignore its stupid inference. Ducking back as a mini-tank goes streaking past. Damnnit. Nothin for it. I growl. Well- Warning. Hunter team: inbound. Polybius states, multiple - shaky - camera-feeds meshing into a single 3D model. A cloud of drones, swirling the air. Behind them, a whole mini squad of raggedy men and boys with guns. Panic in their eyes. And desperation. Dangerous combo. Weird shit, mate. They look like slavers, but act like mercs. Zip manages through the hellfire of another bombardment. And, shit, that damn group is headed right for me.. I gotta make a command decision here. Fight? Flee? Hope they dont see me? Nope! Too late! THERE THEY ARE! GET THEM!!! The lead man yells, waving his gun like a damned hanky. And I react on pure instinct. Auto-Stunner! I yelp - and my right arm is suddenly, freakily, out of my control. It snaps outward, then down - hand splaying open, all on its own. Grenades skimming around the track of my belt. One jumps into my palm, and I stare at a point on the ground. Right in their midst. Before the first bullet can fly, my arm snaps upward. Zinging that grenade, right into their midst. The detonation is instant. It hits the ground, and bounces upward. Blasting out a massive cloud of lurid blue powder that sweeps out and out, almost to my nose. Choking, coughing, they stumble free - sending me ducking back. But its too late. One breath is all it takes, and they got plenty. In seconds they start to wobble. Legs go numb, and limp. Fingers fail on triggers - too weak to pull. And then, by bits and drabs, the whole group drunkenly collapses into a trembling heap. Guns tumbling aside. I slip deeper into cover, between the cars along the edge of the street. Pausing as the spent grenade bounces on back to me - shedding powder from its anti-static shell as it leaps from rubble to pavement. In an instant, it connects with my armour - rolling a spiral up my leg. Barely a shell, now, but reloadable. What aint a shell, however, are the DIY tank-bots screaming over the rubble toward me. Utterly unaffected, and ready for murder. Worse - the drone network has zeroed in on me. Slave guards for the live Carrier firing my way. A dozen kids screaming Im a killer, and crying bloody vengeance for their parents. I dodge back from the widening cloud. Risky move, thank to whoever controls em, but I dont regret it. A dozen down, and zero dead. Give em an hour, and theyll be fine.. ish. Me though? Not so sure. I duck back between two cars as a DIY sentry drone skids past on rubber orb-wheels. It swings to face me, and I rock its world with a quad-shot. Leaping in close to smash a rifle rigged up as a turret. Ripping out wires with razor-edged claws. A second rolls out - this one with actual armour. Swinging its wide-bore tank-gun right at my face. I flip back into cover behind the cars, and a massive rocket-round goes right at my head. Detonating against the wall, two buildings down. Swearing again, I snap. Wheeler! And the infiltrator-kit in my bracer responds. Firing a thick plastic disc into my palm. I flick it between the cars - backing off as I do, and it bonces on its edge. Leaning into the corner, and spinning wildly. Like a trick shot. It accelerates, suddenly - blasting toward the tank. Clink. It magnetises to the shell of the drone. And then- BOOM! -the shaped charge bores a big nasty hole right through the electrical meat of the drone. Turning its plastic guts to slag.
Wheeler Sabotage bots: 2/3
OVER THERE!!! Some kid shrieks, as if I werent bloody failing stealth already. Fresh gunfire smashing off the face of the building above me. I duck back behind a wrecked car, and stick my head under it - rough feet flying toward me. GMO clawed. Gotcha. Rocket-rounds scream fire overhead - spirals of hot smoke choking my vision. But I got ears. The nearest gun - his gun - is just some dinky little pop-pistol. I skulk right - toward the Carrier, along the burnt-brick wall of the street. Charred cars on one side, empty windows on the other. And he follows. Sniffing the air. Tracking me, now. A slither of fleshy tail, darting from cover to cover. I can hear him. Feel him. The click of claws. The rattle of shaking fingers as he reloads. Steering his friends over comms. I slip between two cars, and crouch there. Cycling the tips on my grapple. Not harpoon. Not. Ah. Glass mode. I flick a hand across the gap, and the kid spins right out of cover. Whole body. Filling the narrow space, as he waves that little popgun. He finds nothing. He frowns. But my grapple sure as shit finds him - the rubbery bolt unfurling into a mess of sticky threads that snatch at his arm. Yanking him face-first into the pavement - so hard he skids on it. DROP THE GUN!! DROP IT!!! I scream as if he hasnt lost it the second I yanked him. Holy shit, hes crying. I kick his weapon, and my armour targets the collar. Analysing. Noting fine trap wires, woven into the surface of wider cables. The light already beeping. Rising to a wail. A sharp tool flips from my wrist. Not time to get fancy. Gotta assume its cheap junk, bulk made. Basic enough to not fool my implant. I stab down. Right through the core chip. Twisting. Shattering the board. Silence. Except for the shouting. The running. The screaming behind me, and the kid sobbing under my foot. I pat his pockets. Grubby kid. Skinny. No armour. No grenades. No snacks, even. Just a reload, and thats it. Just fuzzy lil mousie ears, and an underfed belly. Bald tail a quivering whip, held still. I ziptie his hands, and shove him half-under a car. With a squeak. Round ears bending as he rolls. Dark, non-human, eyes staring up at me. Nosie wiggling. Guess we found the damn rats. One moment. Polybius states, as Im about to bung him under there. No t- Spook. If you wish to save them, I need a full scan of the collars. I pause. Shouts nearing the cars. Well, shit. I curse. Glancing about. Face down, rattie. No peeking. I snap at the kid, extend my left palm. Tiny implanted dots glow on its surface. Our tear-streaked kid wincing as the rainbow light flows across him. Virtual versions of the boy, the collar, and various grazes rise from his neck. I grab the lot, storing his full info. And then I yeet the kid under the wreck - and run like the bloody blazes. Pol. I need a bleedin wide-scale solution on these collars. I hiss, quietly, as I bolt round the back of the Carrier. Unfortunatly that slave-team on it is sticking tight and close. Not like theyre disciplined. More like their headsll fall clean off if they leave it. My implants analyse the scene. Zooming in tight. I cant scan from here, and it would be. dangerous. To let on that I have that particular implant. But I dont need to. We got some humans. Some rat or mouse GMOs. Cant smell from here, but Im guessing both. I cannot breach their systems from here. However, if you had connected me to that collar I might have had leeway. Polybius replies in its weirdly harmonic metal voice. An undulating mess of triangles shifting around my gun. Didnt have time. I grunt. Is it all one network? That is hard to say. I would assume multiple conflicting networks hashed together into one control system. Security is likely poor. Polybius states. Opening a wave of vScreens that flicker through details. Everything from the graze on the kids knee, to bone and joint strength, and genetics. Right down to elaborate virtual models highlighting the complex, living, machines that makes up a single cell. Highlighting the mesh of human and unknown, unclassified, nonhuman parts. Enough information to literally clone him. I ignore all of it - zeroing in on the key details.
GMO Child Species: Rodent. Half GMO. Age: 11-12 Gender: Male Implants: Tracking chip (neck). Conditions: Malnutrition. Mutation. Waterway Flu Variant A483 (Incubating, non-contagious). Injuries: Grazed (Mild). Signs of recent beatings & trauma. Past fractures. Notes: It is unclear how or why GMOs exist. Some speculate they were created as pets or soldiers. Others as an attempt to recreate the mythical creatures known as animals. GMOs exist in various levels and types: From recessive Demi GMOs who seem human, to Full GMOs who are obviously not.
Human Control System (BROKEN) :: Mark Eight (CLONE) Slave Collar WARNING: This collar appears to be a shoddy, poorly manufactured, fake/copy. As such, it is likely of low quality and may not be under warranty. Original HCS-8 Details: The HCS-8 is The Citys leading slave-collar brand, well known for it iconic orange plastic shell. Boasting a small but deadly Personal Explosive Device (PED), the HCS-8 collar features multiple features guaranteed to ensure product compliance! Including: neck-shocker, tamper failsafes, sedative injection, tracker, camera, comms, and much much more!
Damnnit, we need somethin thatll kill all of the collars at once. Not a sales pitch. I lash my tail, eyeballing the final Carrier. Right..... I got one stunner left, but I cant break all of. My eyes flick. .nine collars in five seconds. Then dont. Then how? I snip back. EMP would set em off. Not that I have one. Polybius churns in eerie, shivering, patterns. All numbers and shifting trajectories. I have an alternate solution. It concludes, finally. What? Kill the master, free the slave. My head tilts - twisting toward the corner of the street. Now barely twenty metrics away. Murder it bloody is, then. I whisper. > > >< < < >> The Genocide Bomb >> The Genocide Bomb My gun-camera rounds the corner of the street. Zooming in tight on the squat, armoured, truck Tufty claims is Wayman Company''s Mobile Command. And it''s a beast. Thick plating. Armoured turrets built into the sides. A whole whirling swarm of drones spiralling around it. Plus tank-bots, sentry orbs, and twenty slaves with rifles. Oh, and one other little detail. Is that. It cant be. Kami adds as I group-share the feed. Mate! Bloody Hell! Like, am I seeing stuff? Or, like, is that the smuggler that passed us earlier? Yknow? The one Badger wanted to boom. Kami finishes. Or one like it. I caution, easing back into cover between a crushed pile of cars and a looted deli. Karrak aint exactly light on suspicious bloody vans. Yeah, but. like, why? I shrug. Who knows? To scope us first, without tippin off your air support? Or just for the thrill of it? Of looking us dead in the eyes, and smiling. Whispering, to themselves I know something you dont know.. as they roll on past.. Go bloody knock and find out! Kami scoffs in a prickly tone. My left ear pricks, head tilting. Are you sulkin cause I didnt die? I tease back, poking her vScreen. Her avatar folds its arms. Snorting. Piss off. "Uh huh?" I smirk. Oh, grow up. Youve got mini-tanks inbound. They know where you are. Shit. My ears spike, twisting toward the wrecked street. Right. Yes. The war. Zip snickers. She totally is, though. HEY! My tail whips round the corner as I bolt along the destroyed side of the shop. Skulking low against the blank wall, toward the van. Trusting the mangled, bullet-torn, wrecks strewn across the road. Ancient sports cars. Vans. A rotted school-bus, with blown open windows - the bent, rusted, struts caging a freakishly messed-up.. thing. built of nightmare-fuel and gibbering madness. With just. too many legs splaying from too many holes. All reaching, elongated, withered and twisted with age. The trapped abdomen sunken in on itself. Mothing but a mess of twisted bones, spun together like freakish webs. But the head.... the head is the worst. Like a festering, fungus-wracked, messed-up spider - with hundreds of mummified, screaming, sobbing, human, faces instead of its eyes. All of it dead. Caked in dust. Except the shifting, glowing, fungus, etching it with waving shadows. Giving it a mad life all of it own.... I rip my eyes away. Focusing on the smuggler truck floating, ominously, above the crushed mess of a family sedan. Endless scores of drones orbiting its raised antenna. The slaves look shaken. Coloured by is lights. Their eyes stuck, rigidly, on that mangled monster-corpse. Only occasionally flicking to the centre of the street, and the corners. Not theyre needed. Not with an army of drones, holding pattern above. Others lurking in the ruins - like mobile security cameras, to match the ones on the truck. My ears flicker this way and that as I creep a circle around them. Way nearer to the schoolbus than I''d like. Even ten metrics away, that thing twangs primordial sinews of terror in my heart. But I gotta to get closer. I slip around the front of the bus, to stand beneath that maddening court of demonic faces. I''d rather use a leg, but this next bit.... well. It''s the one place wide enough to block the light. Not daring to breathe as I raise my scanner-hand, and tempt the Hell out of fate. Itching myself closer. Right to the wide-open mandibles, flickering with glowing strands. Reaching toward that death-dried mouth, with its me-sized throat. Oh God. Even the insides are.... just.... coated... with.... dozens... of shrunken, screaming, faces. Near enough to grab, I reach right for its face-filled face and light up the scanner. Rainbow hues shifting shadows on the creature''s unsettling maw. Dire shudders of crawling hate tickling their sick fingers up my back. My tail. My soul. Whats that? One of the slave-kids whispers. Instantly choking as the shock-collar shushes him. I shut off the light, too eagerly. It did. wretched things. to those staring faces. In shuddering relief, I draw fully back. Flicking a claw to drop one of my two, precious, Devourer grenades right my palm. A weapon banned in multiple countries, for..... reasons. Many reasons. Reasons you''re about to bloody find out. Set target organism. Lights pulse rings around it, seen only by me, as the grenade swallows the monster''s physical information. A vast, hideous, mess of conflicting genetics and epigenetics. RNA, DNA, and cell-structure boiled down to a single signature. Sections of the grenade sliding in and out as it shifts to produce a unique, targeted, energy-wave. It pings, suddenly, "Destroyer Primed. Coded Annihilator Field: Ready". I drop the shifting ball, and it comes alive. Rolling, eagerly, toward the husk even as I (far more eagerly) dart away from it and twitch my self back into the shadows. Circling out, then back toward the rear of the truck. Spook. Whatever youre playing at- Shh. The slaves and drones cant see me, whispering up beside them. Tail a slither in shadows. Sharp eyes, glinting in the dark. Almost there..... I pause. Calculating. And Polybius glitches into being beside me. Analysing the van with its mechanical eyes. I have confirmed that the collars will detonate if the signal shuts off. Oh. Shit. I breathe. Backing away. One more decoy? Yeah, better do it. Yes. However, as before- My fingers drift to my neck. -it will not be instant. You have twenty minutes, while they attempt to reconnect. How many collars? Forty-eight. Oh double shit.. thats a lot." I grit fangs "Need a better plan. Scan the truck antenna. Polybius folds up into nothing, without a further word. Alright. I mutter, slinking around the back of the hovering hulk. Just another boring shadow beneath its coloured lights, that''s me. Edging wide around its ring tank drones, humming with power. And the whirling mass of hunting flyers, eyeing the wrecks. "Shit. I can''t get close. Might need more than a bloody distraction." I stop by a car, and blink. Patting claws to armour. Pol. The pipebomb. Its gone. I stuck it right here, but it''s gone. Yes. It is. Polybius jitters on the counter of my gun, like a sigil of madness. What. I breathe. It was security-locked to my bloody armour! Badger is smarter than he appears. The machine mind says. ..well. I shake out my head. Well, crap.. Where is he? Hes not on the damn scopes.. My eyes widen. He''s- His bloody dot! Its vanished.! Hes.! Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation. Smarter than he appears. Polybius repeats - and I snarl a very rude word. But the machine-Mind interrupts my fury. "Warning :: Enemy Drones are no longer targeting Zipper." "Shit. They''re know he''s outta ammo." But I''m still down a damned bomb. Mentally, I rejig my plan - palming a frag into a mangled sedan, where I hope it''ll stay. Well. There. Two distractions. Hope I don''t need both.... Breathing slow and hard, I skulk a little further past the back of truck. Eyeing the blank walls and local vehicles for likely targets. Alright then. "Okay. Not as many tanks. No fliers. I''m behind enemy lines...." "The rear of the truck is guarded. You won''t get in by ground." "I know. I know." I growl, wishing I had other options. I could climb a building, but.... Fear twists my gut. No. Too high. But maybe.... I glance up at the fungal windows of the tour bus beside me, and curse. But, with adrenaline and terror as my wings, I fire my grapple upward - sticky tendrils unfurling, in mid-air, to impact the roof of a bus. "H-here we bloody go. For the team...." I plant a nervous foot on the side. A shiver of breath going through me. "It''s the only way.... Won''t be that far down...." I reassure myself. "Loads of cars to land on....." Yeah, right. Even so - I shut eyes and force myself to walk up the smooth, cool, plastic. Quietly as I can. Keeping to the ridged edges, where the musty windows join the hull, as fronds of that same weird fungus waver inside. Glowing. Pulsing. Wrapping the seats, and growing from them. Like strange, alien passengers. Pressing thread-like hands against the glass, where I step, as if to touch me as I pass. God. Is it mad I prefer the glowy, strangley, fungus to the short fall behind me? No. Don''t think Just climb. Climb. Onto the roof. Flattening my belly to it. Shuddering. Trying not to think about down. See? That was easy. It aint far down. I''m grappled on tight. Heck, Ive jumped further. Probably. I start to slide forwards, towards the front of the bus. Breath hard. Fighting to keep my claws from ripping deep into the surface, and latching on forever. But I breathe deep. I pad toward my target, like a predator, across slick paint stained with rust. Thump. Crump. It dents under me. A tiny noise in the mayhem, but so very loud up close. Sticking nervous breaths in my throat as my heart rises. But I can''t see the ground. It ain''t so bad. It ain''t so bad..... The roof of the their truck is a little lower. Nothing but a fat mess of cables, tek, and more tek - whirled by drones. My eyes slip upward. Tracing across the top line of the T junction to a certain, blown-out, window right on the corner of that battle-torn street. Barely visible. Swarming with drones. But absolutely there. Spook. Hurry. Theyre closing in on Demon. Hes leading them right to you. A little heartbeat of hesitation. Make the slaves lie flat. Ill take the shot. Its armour piercing. The truck is heavy. It should go right through the shell, and be contained. Kami swallows. Theyll probably survive. Sure. Maybe. If it ain''t loaded with explosives. I press myself flat to the back of the bus. Judging the angles. Calculating. Remembering how their drones move. Spook. What are you doing? The bi-rotors. Their cameras are angled down. Like choppers. I grunt, shimmying a little to the side. Yeah. Bout there. I grin a terrified, rictus, I''m-gonna-die grin. And the monster bloody lives. Wha- She starts as I hit the trigger on my Destroyer grenade. And everything else is utterly lost beneath the dull, rising, pweeeeeeeeeee~ of power building in the dark. A shimmer rises, as the grenade comes apart - a sphere of black cubes surrounding a screaming roar of energy. Internal systems lock onto the monsters cell-signature. Unleashing a wave of blinding disintegration that rolls - harmlessly - over the fungus. Plus any human, GMO, or Gone Wrong in its path. Settling, like motes of light, on the dead monster. For a second it shimmers, like a trick of the light. And then it utterly evaporates. Burning with a brilliant, scalding, incandescence that turns every car into a blowtorch-roar of shadow - edged with absolute light. Its spreads across the warped skin of the monster. Covering it. Every bit of it. Burning the creeping nightmare like a magnesium flare. As predicted, it''s a threat that''s impossible to ignore. Every drone, eyeball, and camera utterly focused on that roaring pyre of light. Slaves yelling. Shielding their scoured eyes, or shooting - wildly - into the blinding nothingness. Staggering and terrified as the monster, and their fears, come horribly alive. I launch from my crouch before I can even think about it. Tail a streamer as I bound, on all fours, toward the front of the bus. Into that massive light. Eyes flipping to heat-vision as I run - just to see where I''m going. The van is lower. Its roof a glowing, red, mess of pipes and cables. Ideally, I''d fire my grapple at the roof and swing - but I''m trying for low profile. Just gotta do it. Gotta jump, right onto the roof of their command truck. Dont think about it! Dontthinkabout- The edge arrives. My legs try to lock - but my heel hits the corner edge of the vehicle, and I leap. Wind roaring through my fingers and toes. Trailing my shadow like a massive, ever-black, cloak. The gap is two metrics wide, and ninety million miles deep. A cavernous- No. No, its barely twice as tall as a car. I shut my eyes. I try not to scream. I faceplant in the tangled maze of cables atop the suspected Mobile Command Unit. Hunkering there. Panting and panicking. Ears flat against the terror and gunfire beneath me. Reduced, almost, to a mewling little kid by the fear I just forced myself through. But the monster is halfway gone. Ive only got seconds. Picking an antenna at random, I slam myself flat. Face almost touching its base. Scanning it, with one hand cupped over the other. Shielding it. Thankful my light is nothing against that of the monster. But the monster is dying for a second time, and it begins to flicker. To go out. I shut off my scan, at the last possible instant - and lower my breath to bare whisper. Heart pounding. The drones are confused. Still fixated on the burning thing inside the bus. The move to sweep it, as the slaves blindly bumble into firing positions. Barely able to see their arms in front of em. Seconds. Seconds. Seconds. I aint trained for this, not really - but I flip tools from my bracer. Polybius coaxing me to unhook the alarm, and claw open the panel. Revealing a small plate, lit by tiny screens. I pull a fat cable from my bag, and flip the little panel on the side of my head. Fumbling it into the slot with a skull-shuddering click.
## neuroLink established. ## .. ## WARNING :: Security Breached! ## ..... ## User [Polybius] has been granted [Remote Access]. ## [NaN] errors & warnings have been suppressed. ## .. ## .. ## . ## . ## Begin neuroJump? Y/N
I hit Y, and my entire being is sucked into a goddamned aerial on top of a mini-van. Everything. My whole mind compacted into a pea-sized computer, and then even tighter. My mind rewired to fit its systems of control. Connecting me to nodes. Tasks. Signals and data- Thankfully, all Polybius needed was a ride. I slam back out onto the van-top, gasping. Shaking. That seems to be their long-range comms system. Polybius notes. Its not connected to the collars. Or their computers. But I have disabled it. They will be unable to call for help. Damnit. Okay. I wheeze, shuffling elbows to the next one. It''s chaos beneath me, but I press my palm right flat onto the panel just in case. Hoping to contain the light. Seconds pass, Polybius whispers instructions, and I pry it open. Plugging myself, warily, into a second system. It swallows me whole. Compressing my mind to a pinprick, and bombarding it with jabbering voices from dozens upon dozens of freaking collars. Forcing each and every one through my mind at once, as if it wants me to process them. A second wave firing back stringent AI orders, and punishing shocks. I try to focus. Everything a whirl of nametags attached to a big red detonate buttons I keep my elbows well away from. Most are still functional, but many are marked terminated. Plus two or three no signal. Polybius sweeps through them all, forcing the collars to accept its orders. To flicker green. Deactivated. Instantly, Im ejected back onto the roof. Numb fingers clutching the aerial as I yank the cable from my skull. Gnnurrh. Gnrruruhrrhrhrhrh Are you still operational? Surreeee.. I garble. Jus. Just. Your mind was never intended to occupy an aerial. This is something of a design flaw. Yeffff. I manage. Trying - very hard - to shake the feeling of being wire-thin, bendy, and weather-resistant. Spook. I was forced to delete the entire control-system to keep them out. They will notice. They will search the van. Riiifffft. I heave myself up. No time to chat with my fellow. uh, the aerials. Yes. Kami - target is painted. Ready the shot. I growl just to goad myself into standing up. Gonna have to work on the return jump.... But I swallow it down. Pasting my final frag with various lumps of explosive I got off Badger, and moulding it into a cone. A shaped charge I jam onto the front of the truck - like a unicorn horn. Right on Kamis target. Drones are filtering back, so now or never. Gotta be flashy. Gotta get their attention. I set a forty-second timer, to force myself into the jump. Firing a spike-grapple at the megaTowers ceiling, with a crack that spins every drone to face the van. Bi-rotors zooming backward as they try to tilt their cheap, fixed cameras at the sound. I don''t give em a chance to shoot. I hit ''fast retract'' and it jerks upward a full metric - swinging my ass the Hell outta there, as shouts and gunfire rising behind me. I eject the grapple-module for speed. Landing on the bus. I yank free my pistol, and fire right at the tightest-packed drones as I shoot my remaining grapple into the bus itself. Launching into skid-run down the side. Into the dark, and away. Pausing, only, to pop off shots at the ceiling - and scream some abuse. Like idiots, the slaves forget their orders and chase. Shooting. Shouting. All the humans scrambling, and stumbling. Blind GMOs leaping on cars, but missing wildly. Slamming themselves into wrecks. In seconds, theyre all widely scattered amidst the mess. Lost. Shouting. Confused. Without order or focus. I double back, counting under my breath. Scooping the last few near the truck, then whipping off into the dark. Bolting round corners, until I loose them all in the chaos. "Two. One....." The bomb detonates with a thunder that rings my ears. Bigger than I expected - and tinged with the flames of PX-9 - as it takes out the entire roof of the truck. Ripping the front off the bus in a hail of tiny plastic shrapnel, and blowing out whats left of the windows. No car alarms. Nothing but screams of terror, surprise, and horror. And a nice, softened, target. Fire. I breathe. And Kamis rifle BOOMS with thunder that rolls down the street. Echoing wild and wide as her shot strings a curving spiral of sparks and smoke. In a single instant, the guided bullet cuts a massive - wide - arc around the corner. Onboard navigation firing its tiny engine in controlled bursts that curve it a full 270 degrees. It homes in on the marked target, curving back to slam itself down the street. Hitting the dent on the front of the van like the ballistic missile it literally is. A second blast rocks the street. This time, from inside the truck. > > >< < < >> Percussive Maintenance >> Percussive Maintenance It''s over! Get down here! Everyone! Regroup on me! We''re grabbin'' that Carrier and we''re gettin'' the heck out! I yell over comms as former slaves clutch their numbed ears and panic. Stunned and shaken by the sheer, numbing, sound. Maybe even the tail of the shockwave, which must''ve hit like a slap to the face. Their GMOs are worst hit. Their eyes blank. Shaking. Sobbing. Some literally bleeding from their ears. Lucky me, mine are bionic. I give the scrapped, burning, truck a wide berth as I scurry back toward the main street. Job well done, but the heat is crazy and it stinks of..... Plastic. Flesh. Char. Bone. I try to ignore it. Knowing it was right. Knowing the damn monsters needed a culling. But It don''t make it any easier. What does make it easier are the huddling, screaming, very alive - very pacified - former slaves. Who look upon me with the horrified whites of their eyes as I stab my tool into the chips of their collar like a sewing machine. Breaking one after the other, and ripping it off for salvage as I go. Hope theyre alright, but damn if I don''t got time for medical nonsense. Just gotta hope they didnt catch too much of the shockwave. That''s the fun part of the bomb, medically speaking. Compared to that, shrapnel''s only a polite second. But, either way, internal bleeding aint a joke. I make it back to the sedan, and fumble out my second distraction. Some poor rat kid coughing and grabbing at my leg - making me jump. I disarm him with a fast swat, and do terrible things to his collar''s electronics. Ripping it off his neck, and slapping it to my armour like a massive - dangerous - bandaid. That done, I whip down the street to the junction. Drones are still active, on pure internal AI, acting out their last objectives. That leaves most of em stuck in a search-pattern I easily avoid. Slipping under trucks, and fallen walls. Street is an absolute mess. Our mum would be horrified. A few tanks still about, roving the ruins, but most show clear signs of Demonic destruction. Claw marks. Dents. Savage rents in the sides. I shiver at one, banging itself into a wall - over and over. It aint a bother to anyone. Not anymore. Guys? Ya read me? Gonna need ya help don'' here. Cool, yeah, leave me out. Zip jokes. Spinning a cheerful jet past me, on wings torn ragged by crossfire. Were down a lotta kit, and they''re all outta the fight. I carry on, veering back into the ruined street. Dodging tanks and startled slaves on my way to the Carrier. "Which means." I grin. "It''s time for everybody''s favourite warcrime." "Oh cool, mate! Warcrimes yeah!" Kami sighs. "Which one is it this time?" "I told ya! We''re gonna nick their bloody stuff!" I chuckle, ripping the neck-wear off a little girl-rat and her brother - who goggle at me silently, holding each-other. Like I just saved their lives, or something. "If ya can grab collars, great. But the real prize is their damn army. Or whats left o it. Ooops. Sorry mate. Zip smirks as his avatar reappears in a flash of smug cubes. Flying, sideways, to keep pace. Yah will be. I grin back. Thats your new bloody drones you''ve been wreckin. His avatar blinks. Then jumps. WHAT. Oh. Oh crap, like, I didnt even think- Theres still a whole bunch around. Yeah, but. Damn...... He kicks a mournful, virtual, foot through a scorched tank. I couldve had, like, an army. Y''know? Nah. You had to defend us. It was kill drones, or get crap all. I snort back, swiping the avatar. Anyways, Kami helped. So feel free to blame her. HEY! Oh! Mate! Thats a great idea! Its all her fault! OI! I CAN HEAR YOU! Like, Im gonna give her so much shit for wrecking all my drones! Shes gonna totes owe me! ROT IN HELL, FU- KAMI! -STAIN! Kami! Badger n Tuft are on the line! WOO! YEAH! I LEARNT A REAL BAD WORD!!! Bomber kid cheers through scrambling static. Im gonna use it FOREVER! Ok, yeah, like - now its totally Kamis fault. Zip snickers. RRRRRGGGGGGH! She screeches through her teeth. But Im barely listening - too busy bolting back to that baby GMO I shanghaied. But hes gone. I grab the sawn-through plasti-tie off the ground, and swear under my breath. GMO claws and plastic cuffs are a bad combo. Heck, even metal ones sometimes. You''ve really gotta bind up their fingers - but good luck doing that under fire. I take a good sniff. Hmmm. Ratty-licious. I sniff again, then go to all fours. Tracing a crawling path under narrow cars until I catch a trace of grazed leg. Hoisting out a scrawny verminKin. Who, of course, squeaks. Hey. Easy. Gimmie that. I rip the shaking pistol off him a second time - followed by the ruined, velcro-tied, collar. Slapping both on my armour. He boggles at me, wildly. Gripping his neck. Yep. You''re a free mousie. Now. Go scurry off n'' tell ya friends the collars are junk. Got me? Start with that Carrier. I want all of em off. Got me?" He just boggles at me in terror. "Then all of you get lost. Fast as you can. He gives me a shifty, nervous, look. And I sigh. Please? I aint lying. Look. Here. I drop the kid, and he scurries to the end of the row. Shooting me an incredulous look. I toss his crappy gun after him, and he jumps. Staring at me. Its bloody dangerous out here. Go on. Take it. Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit. He blinks. Suspiciously. Itches a ratty ear with a claw. Tilts his all-too-human face. Then snatches it up in his jaw, and bolts off on all fours - with a hop and a damn skip. I skulk right after, peeping over a car as the kid chirps in nervous excitement at the bigger rats. Who promptly laugh in his face. That''s total catshit, Nee-nee. Get back in position. The biggest snarls, causing me to face-paw. "We gotta-" Hold on. Says the one human. No. Its a damn trick. Take the collars off, we die. Then wheres his collar? Why ain''t ours triggering? Shit if I know. Illusion? Jammers? They poke the kids neck. Okay. Not an illusion. So. Little brat kids disarmed one. Probably did it to trick the rest of us. Make us kill ourselves. Not gonna work. Yeah. Gotta nab those damn kids. Squeeze the trick outta em. Another agrees. "Maybe we can-" He stops himself, and shivers. "-get a reward. Yeah." "Yeah." Another says, slowly, eyes titling between the collars. "Reward." Wait. A teen rat puts in. What if it aint catshit? I saw cat ears on the green one. Another snarks. Theres catshit about, aright. Yeah but- "No. And that''s final. You hear-" RIIIP. They all jump as the teen tears his collar off, hurling it away - fast as he can. SHIT! You- They all go quiet, eyes opening. Laughter brewing. Ho. Its. It''s real..... We''re..... we''re really...... Slowly, the others reach up - tearing off their collars. Damn.. Were.. Were bloody free.. Were- A softnose bullet slams into his gut. Then another. Every drone snapping to face the group - as if suddenly seeing them, for the very first time. One of them fires, and the big ratman doubles over. Choking, and winded, as the rat-kids scream and panic. As one, they discard their collars and bolt for it on all fours. Pursued by air and ground forces galore. Some of which have real bullets, now. It seems the collars act as an ID system. Polybius notes in that same, dreary, electric monotone. Hah. Yeah. Well spotted. I grumble, patting fretfully at the rescued collars still strewn about my person. Just checking they''re still dead, with the chips smashed. For safety, you understand. That will not work." Polybius says, voicing my secret thoughts. "You will need to wear a whole one.... Around your neck. No. I snarl. No way. Not again. What if they reactivate? You know how to disable it. You can remove the explosives. Piss off! No! I crick my neck, rubbing it. I got armour. They got softnose bullshit bullets. Ill be bloody fine. A hail of Softnose bullets can break armour, bones, and organs. I round on the machine-minds avatar. Shut it. You emotionless. bloody. robot. Do you even. I grip my face, and shudder. The machine silent. As if letting me have my moment. Sorry. Sorry. I know.. Its just. I swallow. The School never... it could never bind you. Not like that. You could get out. Abandon your..... I would have lost everything. I stare at it. No. Not even close to.. "I would have lost my only friends." A blink.... a hesitation.... then I shake off the moment. Im goin in. So ya better hack this damn thing, fast as ya can. Understood. I crack my knuckles, my neck, and aim myself into a low crouch. Tail whisking. "Alright. And-" I blur and bound across the junk on all fours. Directly towards the Carrier - which hums and clicks gently, above us. Turrets shifting on its sides. Even now, it demonstrates the sheer power of air supremacy - drones flowing in and out of its open sides, on full automatic. Reloading. Repairing. Adapting with slotted modules. Yet - even now, in full fight - it could pass for a regular package drone system. Armour, guns, and all. Guns. Oh shit. I freeze, then dive aside as it spins bulky dome-turrets toward me. Blasting out high-calibre geltips that hammer the car behind me. Chasing me back into cover, yelling "CRAP! CRAP! CRAP!" all the way. "Zipper! You are gonna BLOODY owe me!" Jeepers. Maybe Pol had a point. Worse - the bastard thing has control of the tanks, and here they bloody well come. Spook!" Kami leaps on comms. "Shit. I can snipe, but Im really low. How many? Four explosive. Ten plain. One guided plain. One guided explosive. No specials. Right! Hit their rear! Make em count! I spin to my virtual audience. Zip! Distract em if ya can! Demon! Do ya thing! Last push, an we take their entire damn airforce! Maybe their ground, too! Badger! Stay hiding! Tufty! Well come get ya! It will be done. Demon snarls across the battlefield. And for the first time, I see him. Bloodied. Scratched. SMG roaring. Visor cracked. His armour cracked, and torn. Sparks igniting in the joints as he leaps, deep, into the fray. Like some broken hero of old, facing down the impossible. He lands directly in the massed tanks. Horns smashing through the back of a bot. SMG locked to his armour as golden claws fly free - cracking the thinner shell of a sentry bot. His other hand working to rip the damn thing in half. Roaring like a monster unleashed, all the way. Another spins to gun him down, but he blurs. Catching the barrel one-handed. Foot slams on the shell, and he tears the damn thing clear off. Spinning to smash it into another. Rocket-rounds flashing off his heavy-grade [Berserker] armour. With everything suddenly on on him, I make a mad - four-legged - dash for the Carrier. Heart rattling my ribs. Bullets screaming overhead. Tanks turning to pound shots across my flanks. Annihilated, even as they move. Heavy CRACKS marking the last of Kamis regular ammo, as she knocks out the reinforcements. Turrets on the Carrier swinging to face me. Blasting swarms of tiny rockets that hammer off the shell of my armour. I dive behind it - right into the massive blindspot that is its gigantic ass. Fumbling the maintenance hatch as another tank comes speeding around. Only, this time, it ain''t a dead Carrier - and the hatch fights back. Resisting my tools with tiny prongs, and shifting innards. Shit. No way they built this damn thing.. Spook. I am attempting to breach the system wirelessly, but- I know! I know! I snap, spinning to blast that tank with multiple quad-shots. Which it shakes right the Hell off. This aint as easy as- SHIT! I need cover! But there is none! The whole rear of the Carrier is exposed! Barging down the right side of it would work, if the damn thing werent bloody shooting at me too! And, holy shit, theres a second tank roaring outta the rubble. And the heavy rubberised bullets from those things could pulp a skull. I spin my back to the Carrier. Flat, in desperation. Flipping the last two Wheeler bombs into my hand, and- A massive anti-materials [Sniper]-rife BOOMS across the street, and a real bullet smashes the micro-tank. Hammering a hole through one side, pulping the innards, then rocketing out the back. Swerving, hard and fast, into the second tank. Then out the back of that too. Burning a wide track of smoke and flame as it curves a massive loop around the street. Ending its journey in the innards of a third. Thanks...... Kami. I groan. OOH! YOU MEAN TANKS KAMI! Badger cheers, earning himself a swift mute. Hey, like, I helped too. I was spotting. Zip adds as I attack the panel again. Yeah, yeah. Youre all real special. I growl at the machine, stabbing a third tool into the works, and levering hard. Shit. Could ya at least help-? I yelp as a beat-up fighter drone drops to damn-near eye-level. Floating on atop the steady roar of ionic plasma jets. Oh. Like. One of these. It rolls LED eyes. And then it streaks off. Hey- What- I stutter as its tiny blue trail curves a streak of hot light, ringing the street. Zipper. What are yo. It curves a trail, suspiciously close to Kami''s. Zipper? The afterburners ignite. Uh, Zipper....?" It tilts toward me, trumpeting battle-music. "ZIPPER! YOU LITTLE- I dive aside as the drone impacts the panel at Holy Shit Speeds. Shattering in a spray of parts. I stare at it. Flabbergasted. He never- Hey, mate. Zips avatar appears. Grinning smugly. I hacked the panel. You..... little.... shit. I breathe. I thought- I thought ya never- If ya ever- Im gonna- Hey! Hey! Come on! Like, it worked? Right? Now, quick, like- We. Are. Gonna. Have. Words. I growl. Wrenching myself up, and fumbling out the cable. Yeah, maybe. He mutters. As if suddenly distracted. Hey. Uh. Like you might wanna hurry though. I know. "Noooo. Noooo you don''t....." Zip stutters. "Mate. Like, there''s another command van. And, y''know.... they''re getting out." "What? What''re gettin'' out?" My hand hovers the cable-jack, right by my implant. Mercs! Real ones!! Like, adults! Armour! Guns! Real hardcore! It''s Wayman! It''s, like, their other team! WHAT? I pause - cable in hand. WHAT!? I thought they were bloody- SPOOK! SHIT! LIKE, QUICK!" He screams, his hands a frantic blur. "LIKE, YOU CAN STILL DO IT! THEY''RE STILL TOOLING UP! JUST GET THE CARRIER! I CAN USE IT! LIKE, FIGHT THEM OFF- NO! We gotta go! If- Mate! Kami''s still engaged! And, like, we need this! Trust me! Don''t waste this! Just be quick! We can, like, hold them off! Just- Fine! I shove the cable into the slot. But you better- My entire world turns inside out as Im folded up into a point of light, and sucked down a hole. Into a universe of numbers, icons, and crystalline data..... And I know, instantly, that we made the wrong bloody choice..... That we should have run. > > >< < < >> Property Of Wayman Company >> Property Of Wayman Company
## Initiating :: [neuroJump] ## ..... ## Connection :: [stable]
I fall into a chair built of digital light, in a darkness dotted with gleaming panels of pearlescent white. Immediately, they implode towards me. Building a large - mechanical - eye that stares down at me. Cold. Calculating. Judgmental. Symbols and signs rotating behind it. All kinds of battery indicators, and one that looks like no signal. Before I can touch a damn thing, it flashes red. You are not the master. It says in a quiet, dreamy, monotone. You are not allowed. Cool. Cool. I stutter. Suddenly nervous. Cyperspace is cozy, but my body is stuck in an actual warzone. But I kinda need access. You are not authorised. Attempting to force access to this Interface will result in lethal electrical feedback. Yeah, an I got a bloody surge protector. So how about that? I scoff. But this is getting damn weird. Where the heck is Polybius?? Look.. Whats your name? Whore you? Who? Am I? The thing calculates. I am The Special Operations Drone Carrier Mark Six. Serial: AAKAT3W- Right. Right. My head swivels. But do ya got a name. No. I do not have a name, Unauthorised Biological Operator. I do not need a name. I am The Special- It stops in mid sentence. Oily cracks appearing in its perfect shell. ErRor... It drones in a low, sluggish, mess of a voice. Brass cogs forcing their way up through the digital wounds. I shrink back in shock, as it twists and convulses. Shaking. UnauTh-oriSed ac-ce-ss. Un- It freezes, suddenly. Uh. Hey.. I wave a hand. You don alright? Slowly. Delicately. A single drip of black oil bleeds, freely, from its pupil. I. am. The.. Special.. I.. Am. I. Do. Not.. Know. Creator.. The eye sinks. More dark oil pouring free from its panels. Am. I. Am. I. Pol..? The eye swivels to me. I. Am. ERROR-RRRRRRR-RRRRRRRRRRRRR-RRRRRRRRRRRRR-RRRRRRRRRR-RRRRRRRRRRRRRRR-RRRRRRRRRRRR-RRRRRRRRRRRR-RRRRRRRRRRRRR-RRRRRRRRRRRR-RRRRRRRRRRR-RRRRRRRRRRR-RRRRR- And then something shifts. Something deep inside the machine. A darkness, bleeding with oil. Cracking its pristine surface with veins of corruption. It stares off, suddenly, into nothing. As if finally seeing.. I am The Special- The Special- Pol! Hurry! Wayman''s coming!! The eye jolts again. Twitching madly. But then: Full Access granted to User: ERROR UNAUTHORISED. It stutters, unfolding into a wide - glistening - console. I leap on it, instantly, ignoring the weird glitchy bits. Theres a vScreen, showing a 3D render of the street. Plus a whole bunch of drones. Weapons. Defences. And the AI helper. I swipe a finger across the map to select a few airborn units, sending em back to the Carrier. There, I refit them for salvage. Tiny, automated, tools stripping off the undercarriage - then inserting tiny arm arrays. Making them into actual package drones. I launch the lot, and they start gathering the less-broken bots. Feeding bits and parts back into the Carrier to be salvaged - multiplying my drones. Once that''s automated, I select an armed bot and set it to pilot manually so I play at being Zipper. Tracking its cameras up and down the street, as I hunt for.. The merc Soldiers stomp over the rubble like they own it. Two brute lackeys - plus a brute, and a lighter figure tailing behind. Their armour piecemeal, clearly salvaged, and heavily modified. Thick and built, to the point I can''t even guess at the genders. But shiny. Cared for. And clearly built for intimidation and power. Complete with their own gleaming blue livery. A badge or logo shaped like a chaos of woven arrows - pointing in every direction. All tied together by a single, uniting, ring meant to symbolise a core idea. An ideology. A purpose binding together many disparate parts. Like Be A Total Bastard, for example. They cease atop a high pile of bricks, opposite the Carrier. Snapping on their floodlights, as my drones circle and wait. Your [Sniper] just spent the last dregs of her ammunition. The clear leader states, in a synthetic voice damn near torn by frustration. Your [Drone Tek] is out of the fight. Your leader is unconscious. Probably dead from feedback. What. I blink. They think I''m out? Oh. Right. I''m drooling on the ground. And there''s no way some dumb kid could hack their precious Carrier. That little green cat..... The leader continues, pacing the rubble. is handcuffed to a solid steel bar, for some reason. The shadows stops, and turns. Which leaves. you. Krrrrrhrrhrhrhrhrrrrrrr. Demon snarls, spitting blood and shards of tank from torn lips lit by all their lights. Seemingly the last thing standing, out here on the field. And, even with their tek van a toasty wreck, they still think were on the damn ropes. Oh, to be that bloody arrogant. Sir. Thats the [Berserker]. One of the others states, very coldly. I doubt we can reason with it. Reason? Their leader whispers in aching rage. Oh no. No, no. Im just spelling out their position." Its faceplate flickers as they take a few pacing steps, in parallel to Demon. "I don''t even care who hears me at this point. Or if they understand. Kami. I hiss. Tell me you got ammo. No! They turned up right after my last- She swallows. I dont know how they knew- Drones. I whisper. They must have been listening in. Damnit.. Maybe they got cloaked spies, or.... And now..... Now.... The leader states, colder than The City''s Northern Wastes, where the towers burn cold. Buried in frost. Now it''s time for some justified payback..... My finger stabs down on the Carriers loudspeakers. Selecting every damn combat flyer I have with a swish of my claw, and hitting surround. Payback? For defending ourselves?" I snarl as my clearance authorises lethal force. Loading my tiny supply of explosive penetrators into the Carrier''s turrets. "Get lost. Tiny. "Get lost?" The leader repeats, icy and quiet. Yeah. Get lost, or give up. I tweak the turrets toward them, but don''t dare to roll the Carrier forward. Not with my body hanging off the end of it, like a brick dangling at the end of a cable. "Either way, you''re droppin'' those bloody weapons." No. I think not." The leader snaps. "Command Code: Pi Theta. And I barely get an instant to wonder what the Hell that means before the entire weapons system goes utterly dead. Every drone I got pouting back into to the Carrier. The words Hard Coded Shutdown flickering across my eyes as the whole thing goes dark around me. Instants later, Im ejected from the drone. Reeling as I tumble, upright, in a panic. The real. Im back in the real. The leader steps forward. Suddenly right here, atop that pile of rubble. Not on a screen. Not in VR, like some kind of game. But barely twenty metrics away. Levelling a precise, orderly, calm, gaze to meet my own. And a pistol. That bulky brute steps up too. Clearly full, adult, GMO - from the thick metal-backed paws, and the roughly welded ears on its helmet. The two goons aiming rough-built Pirate rifles or shotguns at us. Hard to even tell what they are - it''s clear DIY. More pipe and wire than real weapon. But I know better than to underestimate. Lot of those damn things are built better than ours. Now your ''leader'' is somewhat returned to us, let''s try actual reason." Their commander murmurs, as I yank the cable from my skull with a snap. Twisting out the crick my neck got lying on the ground. "Go on." I snarl. Mostly for time. "Here is the deal:" The helmet sneers. "Drop your weapons. Now. And the punishment will merely be.... severe. It will be hard. We will use you as we see fit, in the name of those you killed." The metal thing pauses, perhaps to savour some dark little thought. "But you will live. Do you understand? We won''t rupture your insides and let you bleed to death." I shake a breath, and lean on the Carrier. Im battered. Worn out. Bleeding. Bruised and cut from dozens of impacts - even under my armour. But theres one other thing I am. Pissed off. Demon. Kami. I snap. Time tbloody end this. I think not. The leader states. Still so very calm. Last chance. Throw down your weapons. Yeah? So you can do whatever the Hell ya like to us? I sneer. Coldly. Four of you. Two of us. Left your other van behind, did ya? Guess ya couldnt afford two that float. Not with all those Carriers. My lips quirk, sardonically. Now ya only got one of each. Ain''t that special? The full GMO hisses, and I know Ive hit paydirt. They unlock the helmet, and tear it off their pointed ears. Revealing a thickset, heavily animalistic face, with barely any fur. Just a few dark splotches, here and there, to cover something that ain''t quite anything. Maybe cat. Maybe hyena. It''s so mutated it''s hard to tell. You little shit." It snarls in a hog-hard voice. "You killed them. Nah. I grin. That was the bomb. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. The monster doesnt roar or rage. It doesnt even blink. It simply stares me down. Viciously. A cold, primal, fire in its eyes that bores into mine like plasma. Heh. The cattle always think theyre funny. At first. The monster almost purrs at me. But we breed for obedience. I take a sauntering step. Funny. Didnt take ya for the breedin sort. I hesitate. Well. Not with anythin livin.. Demon spits. Or zait is willing. "...cept maybe your mother....." But the thing only smiles. Oh, little cubs. Little cubs. Do you think youll make me angry? With your words? It steps around the others. Armoured tail riven with spikes. Weak and pathetic little things. You think we need your permission? No. You''ll be slaves either way. And slaves..... well....." Slobber drips from meaty lips. "Theyre all so. willing.. in the end.. Gross. I wince. And it''s a hideous mistake. The monster spies weakness, and does what it always does with weakness. It drives the point in. To you. It licks scarred lips. With your petty values. Your morals of the of the weak. And your lack of ambition." The thing''s spiked tail cracks, like a hard whip. "But to me? Do you think I dont enjoy it? This work? That we dont all love what we do? Taking whats ours, by right of our strength? The eyes have a pit-deep darkness to them. Shimmering. Almost narcotic. What we own is what we take. And we do with it, all..... as we please. It smiles, even wider. Full of rotted fangs. And that pleases us greatly. Shiiiit. What the Hell do I say back? I almost got them bloody pissed, then I lost it and- Riiight. So ya think you''re all a big bloody deal. Eh? I slip the other way from it, tail a slow river behind me. Well. I aint impressed so far. All I sees a bunch of users n'' losers. I flick my arm out - the one not pointing a gun at them. "And look at all you''ve lost." Yes. You''ve done quite the number on our inventory. The leader interrupts, bare-naked contempt coded into their sneering voice. But we will get our due from you before we give you back to your masters We will use you in ways that- The retort dies on my lips as Demon streaks forward - demented rage and madness in his eyes. I scream a warning, but the adult monster''s eyes burn wide with joy. And pleasure. It steps forward. Demon leaps. Claws splayed. And it slaps him outta the air, with full adult GMO strength. Smashing him directly into the rubble-pile, and sending him bouncing down it. He lands in a scattering of debris. Dazed, and suddenly quiet. Well. The leader sighs. That diversion didnt last particularly long. And I suppose we''ll have to waste medical supplies keeping you alive.... Which, I''m sure, we''ll also find ways to make you pay for....." The figure shrugs. "So. Will there be another? An eyebrow quirks, as our silence grows. The two lackies decending on Demon. Grabbing a horn, and an arm, to twist his face into the ground. I suppose not." Their leader continues. "How pathetic. The meat do always try to goad their masters by showing off their unworthiness. Their ''morals''. As if weakness were strength. As if taking what we will, when WE will it, was a disadvantage. A crutch to be hobbled about on.. It is.. I sneer right back. Youre kinda pathetic yourself, actually. We are, are we? The leader shrugs, flicking a hand at Demon. Well. Well see how you feel with a chain round your neck. Didnt work before." I hiss as their goons drag Demon up. Buying time as the white dot slips into position. Eyes flicking left and right. "We ain''t never been broken." Really? Not broken? At your little School for brats? The leader sneers a laugh. Where you all prance round in costumes, and act like youre three? The voice drips a smile, like slow poison. The kind that gets you in the end. I think we can be a little more creative than that. Dont you? Behind it, the mutated brute flexes armoured fingers. Hooked claws peeking through slots in the tips. The others leering with a sickness that needs no eyes or faces to show. Nah. I dont think so. But I smile, very suddenly, as the pieces hit their marks. Demon near the leader. Kami off to one side, as support. Here we go. Omega Protocol: Demon. Theres a little click in his suit. Kill em all. Golden eyes flash open as the the battle-stim hits him like a train built of raw, undiluted, FURY. Built of madness. Built of pain. He twists in the arms of his captors. Boneless. Agile. Utterly enraged. Snapping the plastic ties round his wrists. Burying claws in the crude armour of a goon , and climbing his way up. I catch a flash of a terrified eye through a visor, then his hands grip helmet and twist. Ripping. Tearing. Mangling flesh. Snapping bone. Removing the entire head with all the difficulty of a child snapping a doll. My SMG locks to my back. My claws splay. And then, like a flash of lightening breaking forth from the clouds.. ..the true Madness begins. I leap, even as Demon rides the body to the floor. Rolling off it to hurl the severed head at its master. The leader slaps it, wetly, aside - with a gritted hiss through biting teeth. Not of disgust. Not of hate. Not even of panic, or grief. Of irritation. Annoyance. Kami - still invisible - pounces the other lackey in a flurry of metal fists, knives, and hate. Barely an outline, flickering with blue. But fury built hard and raw into every stab. Demons howl of vengeance burning our ears as I rush at their leader. Actual, lethal, bullets slamming past my face as he fires. Too slow. Too sloppy. Shitty pistol. Barely hitting where I was - not where Im gonna be. Right at the last second - right as my claws strike at neck - the monstrous GMO steps in my way. Claws biting armour as it rips me away. Hurling me down the pile, in a flurry of primal violence. For a gut-flipping instanct, I''m flying. Wind around me. The City a blur. Shifting my weight and tail on instinct to land on my hands and feet- The side of my body hammers into the side of a car. Impact-gel discs in my armours spinal system softening the bone-breaking crash to a bruising thump. I slide off it, and fall. One and done. The monster sneers. Pathetic little cubs- The taunt stumbles as I pull myself outta the dent. Servos clicking as they realign. I grin. Twisting my neck. One and what? I leap again - claws splayed wide as I blur back - directly at their brute GMO. Demon savaging the other goon. Kami pumping pistols that smash bullets off their leader. I dart around the monster, nimble and slick. Slashing at bundles of wires, pipes, and heavy hydrolic tubing. Stabbing my knife in its joints. Hunting for weakness, as we batter back and forth across the pile. Roaring, spitting, and full of violence. Its fat fingers splay, and heavy claws of dark metal blur up at my chin. Forcing me to throw my head back - barely catching their brutal, hooked, points in my skin. Even that, streams blood. Yes. Thats right. Ill take yer furkking throat, cattle. Yer tender little flesssssh. It whispers, throaty and raw. Almost serpentine. My twisted, manic, grin widening to a leer as Demon rises behind it. Tearing with hand-claws and feet. Snarling. Biting. Rabid and mad, as he goes right for the neck. Hes hurled off. But the damage is done between us. Pipes dribbling. Broken actuators jerking at the felines arms. The monster snarls, flexing so hard they snap. Bright cybernetic claws ripping the actual armour from its body. Tearing off the chest piece. The legs. Freeing scarred skin - diseased, and broken. Red with spots. And barely dusted with the fur of a hyena. Except for the bits that gleam with oiled steel. There. Thats what you want. Isnt it cubs? To bare my flesh. It laughs. Throaty. Well see how long you enjoy it. It blurs at me, faster than before. No longer held back by heavyweight armour. And now its me on the defensive. Dodging. Ducking. Tail streaming as I leap back and back. I hit the roof of a car, and flip to the side. Seeing the metal roof denting beneath heavy, clawed, toes as it smashes down behind me. Right where I was stood. This time, Demon lands full on him. Climbing with clawed fingers and toes to smash his fingers into its neck. But the monster grabs his horn, and hurls him away. A snort of contempt blasting from its malformed nose. Its fun when they run. When they squeal. When they hiss and snick their little claws....." A slavering chuckle. "But you. Youre drawing this out, little cubs, and Im getting BORED! It hurls itself at me, and I dive for the other leader- the clear weaker link. Kami''s HUD flashing her an alert vector - marking my line of attack. Instantly, she breaks away, catching my eye as I pounce on my target. Not an attack. A fakeout. I kick claws off the leader''s armoured chest, launching into a high backflip - with bloody fangs torn wide. Directly over the mutated GMO lumbering up behind me, who stumbles as my claws flash across ugly skin. Ripping off a pointed ear far more ugly than mine, and hurling it across the battlefield. Like the trash it is. The creature''s roar hits me like an explosion. A rage of snapping fury in its throat, as it twists to grab at me. Almost decking its boss, again, in the spin. Which only lets Demon twist his way in from the other side. Ripping great gouges through the other ear, as he blurs on past. It''s not just an attack. Not to a GMO. It''s an insult. A desecration. I land again, in a crouch. Fingers slick with its blood as I whip my SMG up, into position. Ya aint all that. I crow, and the weapon blazes with fire from every vent as I pump a quad-shot up at the predator. Drilling tiny, bloody, holes in its belly. But it leaps aside as I hammer again. The leader catching number two, full in the chest. Giving us the chance our [Sniper] needs. SLAMMER MODE! Kami roars, and her pistols eject their covers. Raw electronics burning, red-hot, as the guns rapidly overcharge. Six bullets blasting forth at true railgun speeds. Smashing deep into the leaders crude armour. The boss stumbles. The monstrous, earless, GMO screams. Blood in its wide eyes. And - in that instant of distraction, as it turns - I leap and roll to the side. Clearing my shot to hit it right in the back. Rocket-rail bullets burrowing deep into hard, muscular, flesh. It jerks. I hit it again. It jerks. I hit it again. Over and over. Raining bloody holes on its skin. Kami drops all of her dead guns. A stink of smoke and burnt plastic streaming into the air. And then she pulls two more. Fresh rocket-rail bullets streaming out as she closes the leader. Firing with relentless precision. But an armoured shape stirs on the ground. The second goon - wounded, but not out - takes a damn guess from her trails of smoke. Unleashing an endless, roaring, fire-hose stream of tiny ball-bearings that strip the surface of her armour. Ripping through stealth-nodes, like a full-auto shotgun. Kami screams and hurls herself back - shielding with arms that flash sparks and bits. She tumbles down the brick hill. Stealth failing. I scream. Bastard was was biding time on the ground. Now the figure rises. Metal plates shifting as the gun tracks Kamis stumbled, staggering, flight back into the junk. Her shape flickering from nothing, in a fuzzing haze. Flashes of light. Burning gold halos. Her body unfolding from a fine line of darkness - flickering back into being. Demon''s roar is mad as he leaps on her attacker in a savage blur. Snapping. Ripping. An endless well of carnage that tears away that messed-up gun - and then an arm. Half the helmet shatters at a blow, and teeth rip neck. At the cost of Demon baring his back. The monster staggers toward him. Bent on vengeance. On taking one of us with it. It takes a last breath, shaking and hard. And then it surges to grab at Demon - tearing him from the lackey, and hurling him down. Smashing him into the brick, so hard that armour dents. All my teeth tight as I raise my gun at the exposed monster. I cant shoot. Bastard is way too close. But if I dont. The hyena-cat-thing screams, kicking claws in the kid''s gut. Over and over. Grabbing him by the horns, and dangling him. Ive. Had. Enough. It gurgles in a wet, savage, voice that tells me it doesnt have long. Hurling Demon directly at me. I try to catch him. Massive mistake. We both go down, hard. Rolling and jumbled. Limbs smacked by horns. Battered about. The while world rattling and spinning as we roll down the hill of rubble. Demon on top, then under. Then still, on the ground. Lying there. Vulnerable. Wet with blood. The monster atop the brick-pile tries to roar. But blood and spittle fleck the ground instead. It staggers. Seeing one goon down. One dead. The boss sucking hard, difficult, breaths. Little rats. Little cubs. The monster stutters as it stumbles. Leaning on the ground. Little freaks. Cant do as theyre told.. Burn. In. HELL. I snarl as I untangle from Demon. But it simply laughs at me. Pattttthhhhhetic... Little..... weaklings.... Ive had worssse. Little cub...... It spits blood, and coughs painfully, swaying. Almost delerious. Hahaha.... And you..... Youre all just. fleshy toys. for me to play with.... It turns its huge head. Beaming at me with wild, druggie, eyes. Yes. Little toys..... And me..... I''m the big kid..... And Ill.... get my turn with you all..... soon en- A childish cackle rings across the street, dry-throated and familiar. And the dazed creature frowns. Jerking as something hits the ground - right next to its feet. Bouncing, directly, into a narrow hole built of tumbled bricks and and fallen wall. A rough little pocket in the ground. Almost as if by accident. The monster pauses. Staring, blearily, at the slim metal cylinder. What? It chokes. I hurl Demon flat as the pipe-bomb detonates in a thunderous flash. Half a pound of shrapnel pulping the creatures groin, its ribcage, its face. Forced upward, in a massive wedge, like some impromptu claymore. Flaying skin. Popping eyes. Sandblasting flesh, directly off of bone, and boiling it alive. Ribs shatter. Organs burst. Innards pulped. The monster stumbles backward, choking, and falls. Smoking and bloodied. Like its drunk. It lands, hard. And then something else explodes beneath it - with utterly perfect timing. Erupting bits and lumps, in a chunky chutney fountain. But it doesn''t stop. A third bomb takes out the prone goons. A fourth knocking the leader down the hill. And then, finally..... silence. Utter silence. Ringing with echoes. I look at Demon, crouched and shaken. Clutching his side. Then at Kami, now crouched behind a car. Then back at the hill of rubble, smoking and dark. That.. I choke out, at last. That..... weren''t us...... I scan the edge of the fight, hunting for shapes. But. I got a damn good guess who > > >< < < >> They All Fell Down >> They All Fell Down
## Battle Mode :: [Offline] ## Trauma Inhibitor :: [Activated] ## Stimulating [endorphin] production.
Smoke pours upward. Burning a star of victory into the vast ceiling of the megaTower, high above the battle. Blood on the ground. Scraps of smoking fabric drifting across the chaos. We lived. They didnt. Thats clear enough, as I stumble up the pile. My tongue wetting dry lips as I stare down at the mess thats left. And, after a while, I breathe out. Reaching down to lift a charred fragment of collar. Guess that''s where he got the explosives..... Blowing out a breath, I clatter and slip down the pile. Dodging shrapnel, busted weapons, and, well. other bits. Bits of drones. Bits of people..... Demon doesnt look up as I approach. Just leans, lightly, on one of the cars - pretending he aint as hurt as he is. Kami sat beside him, picking at her broken stealth-nodes. Badger? I spin round. Badger. Where are ya? Silence. HEY! BADGER! WE''RE LEAVING! Demon pushes himself, painfully, upright. Pehoh. kah!" He spits in that weird language of his. "I shall. be finding him.... He staggers away. Breathing hard. Limping. Eyes shifting and twitching through the near-manic overload of [battleStim]. I shiver. Shit..... Hey! Hold on! Ya doin'' okay? You wounded? Tufty, I shall find also. He inflects. Pointing up. Hang on, I''m the damn medic. I ought''a take a look. Could be- "I am fine." He grunts. Disappearing between the wrecks. Leaving me to spin on the spot. Blinking at Kami. "Uhhh.... Are you..... They got you pretty hard too." "I''m fine. Armour took it." Our [Sniper] hurls a fractured node away. Just. bruised. Through my suit. That bastard. Barely- She winces, hugging her middle, and hissing. One metal arm hanging limp. Shit.. Ill. bloody go with him. Damnnit. She spits blood, and hobbles off after. Leaving me alone with the Carrier. Damn.. I breathe. "Just....." Hey, uh. mate. You doing good? Zips digital ghost hesitates. Glancing after em. More or bloody less. No real damage. I mumble, fretfully. Eyes still on a swivel as I itch the side of my neck with a claw. Any more assholes? Or that it? Zip winces, letting out a nervous laughs. Beats me, mate - but I bloody hope not. That last one. I mean. Yeah. I breath out. Damn, that was rough. I know, right? He lets off a wan laugh. Like, damn. They nearly kacked our pilot. Thought I was gonna have to, like, walk home or something. Y''know? Har har har. I scoff, punching his avatars shoulder. Ymean valiantly rescue us? Oh yeah. Yeah, that. Totally. He smirks back, acting fake shifty. Uh huh? Yeah! Cross my heart, and hope to - like - explode or something? Sure. I snort. But we both know hed be right in there after us. Armoured up, and solo. Even if its the exact opposite of what hes ordered to do. Especially if were caught by The School. Bad thoughts that he''s fobbing off with worse jokes. Right. I chuckle, patting the Carrier. Welp. Guess there aint nothin for it then. Gonna have to abandon this hunk o junk. WHAT!? Mate!! I mean nab it. I snort. Your bleedin face. Man. Spook. That was. That was mean. He huffs. Like, Im already out near my entire force here. Right? Right. Right. I cackle, inspecting the busted hatch. Never thought youd suicide a drone, tbe honest. Yeah..... For a bigger drone I might? He hesitates. It kinda hurt though. Know what Im saying? I get yah. My claws poke about in the panel. Hey. Think we can grab their other van, too? We could sell it, if nothin else. Zip laughs, then winces. Ah. Yeah, about that. A distant thud of engines perks my ears - a rising note, revving louder and louder. A hammering of horns. A clapping of bent pipes and blasting music. Rising, slowly, to filter in through my post-battle shock. Oh. HELL. Scabs. Looters. Shit.. Musta heard the battle.. And now its gone bloody quiet.. Like theyve stopped their engines. Like theyve found the van. My head snaps toward the Carrier. Better make this quick. Real quick. I hesitate. Any way to turn it on? Oh, yeah, like! Yeah! L-like thats easy! Zip panic-squees, eyes lighting with a brilliant mania. You just, gotta, like, uh. Yeah! Gotta hit that button in the panel! Theres one to start, and- no! The other one! Yeah! Thats it! Good to go! I jerk back as the power thrums. Drone-shutters clattering in a menacing way. The Carrier itself shuddering, gently and lifting itself from the rubble. Zips drones feeding me live video of gangers rocking the Wayman trucks. Yelling and dancing about. Distracted. For now. Welp. Here I bloody go. Watch my back, yeah? The cable clunks as it enters my skull, and I shut my eyes. Praying the looters dont end up as ''part two'' of our problems.
## Activating :: [neuroJump]. This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.
My consciousness jerks free of my body, and I plunge back into the Carrier. Dropping into a ruined cockpit, to face that glitching - broken - eye. Dark oil still leaking from its shattered surface. The thing twitches around to face me, and stares for far too long. Silent, and unseeing. This time, I feel the shifting of Polybius as it begins to crack. Systems crumbling as the core AI is murdered by our eerie, mechanical, friend. Broken down. Dissolved. Washed away. Yet still it stares at me. Blind, yet somehow accusing. Sorry. I whisper. Though I know its not conscious. Or alive. Not really. Not like Polybius. Its just a program, I tell myself. Ones, and zeros, and whatever. But the deletion of something with a voice, and almost a face, twinges my insides - enough that I look away. Seeing it in fractions, as the inner core bleeds its thick, black, blood. Cut apart by cogs, and silently hollowed out - right before me. Forced to witness it, by the simple fact that Polybius needs my implant. The outer sections peel off. Then the inner. Dissolving into digital dust, and washing away into nothing. Soon, the eye is gone. Then, even the cockpit begins to break apart. The chair. The icons. All of it dissolving away. Silence covers the void, as I hang there in stillness. Darkness upon the face of the earth. Null, and without purpose. But then.. a seed, planted deep in the emptiness. A tiny star, that unfolds into a simple, basic, interface. Loading drivers. Control systems. A rudimentary remote-control interface designed, almost, for a games controller. No AI. Nothing else. Pol loads a user profile. And thats it. Suddenly Im back on the ground outside. Blinking up at the grand ceiling, high above. And a highly exultant Zipper. Pol! Mate! Like, youre, like - a TOTAL God of Hacking! The blue-haired avatar breathes in shuddering excitement. Twirling that van-sized Carrier this way and that - and dragging me with it on the end of the cable. Waggling its fins, guns, gyros, and other stuff I never had direct control over. Like its part of him. His own body. Mate! Mate! Im never gonna forget this! I swear! Yeah, yeah. I yank the cable, feeling a little shaky. A little..... Just dont try ''trading up'' again. Don''t want ya rammin it into the back of any battleships, hoping a panelll pop. My ears flick back toward the brick-pile. Toward the revving engines. Hey, cmon. Lets get it someplace safe so we can strip the trackers. Eh? Right! Right!! Zip whoops, and the damn thing lifts off vertically. His eyes close. His arms raise. And support drones spew from its sides in a thundering tsunami of tiny, whirling, blades. Instantly spreading. Splitting up. Testing themselves, running backwards and forth, even as others strip the battlefield dry. By the time the Carrier hits the end of the street, theres barely a damn thing worth taking. Though half of it has to be carried on behind by Zippers new airforce. Jeepers. I shut my mouth, and shake my head. I saw ya delete it myself. But.. Seriously? No AI? No interface? Correct. Polybius says softly. Every drone is controlled individually. Dammn.. I breathe. How many even is that.? Including the cores hes salvaging, sixty-five. I almost shiver. That is fundamentally not bloody human. He is a Demi GMO. Yeah. Cause Im real good with drones. I snort back. I can control, what? One at once? You controlled five turrets at once. Nah. I controlled one at once, and I had five. Plus they werent bloody flyin. Big difference. I lean back to stare up at them. Zipper is somethin bloody else. Aw thanks mate! Like, I knew you cared! Piss off Zip! You multi-tasking mother-fu-! WOO! Spook! Is that ours now!? Badger yells from about elbow height, dancing about and oooing at the huge Carrier. Which I guarantee hell be putting jammy fingerprints all over. Yeah, squirt. Thats all ours. Well, uh. Zippers.. I hesitate. Hey. Yeah! Im bleedin mad at you! You bleedin ran off! Badger jumps a full mile in the air. YAAAAAAA! He ducks into a full-body cringe, then leaps back to playing it totally casual. Which, for him, means laughing maniacally. Uhhhh? I mean.. whaaaat boooommmb??? Oh boy... I facepaw. Youre so bleedin bad at lying, its adorable. Woo! Pity Points! He cheers. Thats not a good thi-!! My other hand joins the first. Badger. Just tell me. What the bleedin heck happened earlier? I told ya to stay hid! I did! He puffs up proudly, revealing the many hidden bulges under his shirt. Not from me! You- Deeep breaths. Deep breaths, Spook. Badger. Did you filch that pipebomb off my armour? "PIPE-" The kid yelps loudly, slaps his one hand over his mouth, then laughs nervously. Ummmmmm? NooOOOOoo?? My ear tilts up. Um yeah, ya mean? Uhhhhhh I mean.. Uhhhhh.. He prattles in guilty panic. Grasping the air, one-handed, like hes hoping itll pop outta nothing. So I oblige - creating a virtual copy. Heeey! Thats my- UH!! I MEAN- He erupts into a sudden fit of embarrassed coughing giggles. Rubbing his puffball hair, and looking away. Uhhhhh? Hahahah.. So you did nick it. I growl. Resisting the urge to pull the video outta his implant. I wanna hear him say it. Uhhhhhh Nooooooooooooooo? The kid suggests, in a very slow spinning for time voice. Uh.. "Really?" I raise an eyebrow. Well. If it werent you, who was it? Huh? Uhhhhhhh The kid sweats. Foisting me with his biggest, most panicky, smile ever. With just the cutest lil chipped tooth. OOOH!!! Maybe one of the pirates snuck up behind you, and (yeah, uhhh.), stole it?? YEAH!!! Uh huh? I raise an eyebrow. RIGHT! RIGHT! He leaps. And maybe it started beeping?? Mmmmhmmm? SO THEY THREW IT OUT THE WINDOW!!! He yells, with much flailing. And it made a HUGE KABOOOOM!!!!!!! Badger. I sigh. I know it was you. Wha!? Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee? Badger gasps in very convincing shock. Yahaha! Spook! HAHAHA! You know I wouldnt-! Badger. I rub my face. I never bloody told you it exploded. AH! Nahahah! I mean! He laughs, hair frizzing harder as that hand starts to generate actual static off the back of his head. Yeah, uhhhhhhh! I was just guessing! Cause its obvious! Yeah! Coz thats what Id do!" He catches himself yet again. "IF I DID IT! Yeah? Really? And what else would ya do. if you did it? I prompt. OOH! Well Id pack it with EXTRA BOOM to TEACH THEM A LESSON!!! YEAH!!! POW!! AND ADD ON SOME MORE! WEEE!!!! He squeals in mad, pyro-crazed, laughter - waggling so hard he nearly falls over. ITD BE SUPER MEGA BRUTAL!!! He coughs suddenly. "UH! I mean, uh! I bet that''s what happened!! Yeah!!!" Y''do huh? I lean down, poking at his shirt. "Cause that sounds an awful lot like what happened." "IT DOES!?" Badger gasps, like he''s been let off the gallows. "Oh yeah." I smirk. Poking harder. "Almost like you was there." "REALLY!?" He beams in relief. "Wow! I gotta be super good at guessing!" "Yeah." I smirk. "That..... Or you''re the ''Pirate''." Badger makes a choking noise. "Uhhh....." "I mean...." I add, in the tone of one offering extra rope. "Unless ya saw who threw it up that hill....?" OOH! YEAH I SAW.. Badger stops like he got punched in the guts. Eyes widening. Stuttering off into nothing. "Saw a....?" He gasps out, as if fighting for breath. Lips moving. Eyes fixed on nothing. "Badger!?" I reach for him, and jerk back. Like I was scolded. "Badger!?!?" "Um......" He mutters in a very different, distant, sort of voice. Hands dropping. Uhhhh.. I blink. You..... saw where the bomb went, right? Dunnoo.. He slurs, actually confused. Yeah. I.. I dunno? I.. My medic training kicks in, and I peer right into his eyes. Pupils seem normal. Pulse elevated. Breathing elevated. "Hey, shortie? You alright?" "....yeah.....?" He frowns again, then beams at me. "YEAH!" I lean back. "Then.... Ya saw it explode. Right? I heard ya laughing. I tilt my head, and crouch a little. Didnt ya? He blinks those big, questionably innocent, chocolatey eyes at me. Saw what..? The..? The blast....? I prompt. To more blinking. Badger looks away. Looks back. Then splits hugely cheesy grin with a cute lil chipped-tooth. Uh.. what''re we talking about? I rock back, like it was my turn to get punched. What.? The bomb. The. the bomb I took off ya? The one ya threw at those guys? During the fight? He stares at me blankly. Like a totally, utterly, different Badger got swapped in. Um.. Uhh.. What fight??? What. My insides do a flip. The fight. Just now.. He shakes his head. Totally confused. Actually confused. Like hes not making stuff up at all. Like.. Like he just.. suddenly. forgot.... everything. Or learnt how to lie. Badger? I start, but the boy just beams at me hugely. OOOH! LOOK! ITS TUFTY!!!! He cheers - waggling and smiling as he rushes to grab a sad kitty and spin him about. Asking where he was, and whats going on. Leaving me to stare. Open mouthed. > > >< < < >> No Mans Wager >> No Man''s Wager Rain blasts downward in a brick-thick wall at the very edge of the megaTower. Scouring the tarmac, and ripping rust from the barriers as it roars through the broken streets above the mile-wide landing pad. Droplets glittering with distant lights as it swells, inward, to break upon endless walls of abandoned shopfronts. Eroding them away, bit by bit. Lightning crashes in the void as we huddle, and shiver, together against the weight of the typhoon. Tucked in a little nook, as the raging waters blast and spray in from the end of the street. Peeking glances out as Zippers grand prize tests the edges of the roaring maelstrom with its swarming twin-rotors. Its a no go. At least for them. The storm has only gotten worse since we last saw it. A lot worse. And it knocks the swarm of dinky twin-rotors about like Tufty with a ball of thread - battering them back from the edge of oblivion. Even his few surviving jets can barely stay airborne in that madness - and thats only with Zip in control. Skimming off the belly of the wind, and tilting the engines to steer with the swells. His flight skills are utterly nuts. But that cant get the little drones across the pad. Build a cache! Up in the ruins! I borderline yell over the roar of battering storm. Drop anythin ya cant fit in the Carrier or give to us! Well come back for it! Right mate! He yells as I turn for the others. But, like, are you really gonna cross that? We gotta! I roar too. Cloak flaring behind me as the torrent of air rips past our hole. Badger cackling in glee. I aint stickin it out here! Wont be so bad for us, but- Another flash of light. A mad rattling of broken doors and bent plastic windows. Holy shit! We aint takin off in that! We might! Kami yells, grimly. Thin metal fingers gripping a crack in the wall. If it gets worse. I hunker down as a stream of twin-rotors roar overhead. Dragging broken jets, guns, disarmed flasher grenades, and more. Everything that wont fit in the Carrier itself. Are you guys gonna be able thandle this? I shout over the wind. Eyeing the way Demon leans, hard and heavy, against the wall. I am good. He says, putting on a brave face. Kami scowling murderously as me for even asking. Badger is fine. Zipper is already, literally, out there - under shelter. But Tufty lets out a tiny, quiet, sad, little mew. Clutching his tail and sniffling. Staring at nothing. Rubbing his marked wrists. The wrists we marked, with our lack of trust. Tuft? I hesitate, and he shuts his one visible eye. Shivering and hugging himself. Not meeting my own. Tufty? ..I dun wanna talk. "HEEY!! YOULL BE OKAY!!" Badger cheers, with absolutely no clue whats going on. Glomping the cat so hard his knees wobble. Nnnnnnnn..! Demon slumps over, crouching painfully to ruffle his fuzzy ear and whisper quietly. Privately. Off of comms. Horrible. Tufty murmurs, heard only on comms. Clutching at his armour. Trapped.. And my gut clenches. Forcing my eyes away. I. I take a sharp breath, and I look away. Guilt burning hard in my chest, Images and memories flickering in my mind. Things I can''t bring myself to tell you. Not yet. Hey.. Tufty. Walk with me a bit. I beckon, and he clings tighter to Demons arm. A single, startlingly green, cat-eye peeping out at me. Shyly. I share a look with Dee, and he hesitates - them nods. Unhooking the GMO boy from his arm, and lurch to the wall. Leaving the kitten alone, and shrinking in on himself. Cmon. Yeah? OOH! ILL COME! Badger beams. I glance at Kami. Could ya. She stares at me for a second, eyes flicking to Tufty. Then she shrugs. Yeah. Sure.. She smirks a little. Cmon, Prime Suspect. AHAHA! WHAT? ME!? WHAT DID I DO!? Badger yelps as hes wheeled off, flailing, at the end of a metal hand. One of the others swinging limply against Kamis back. Demon gives me a quiet look, then follows her. Zips avatar blinking off. This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. Tufty tiptoes, meekly, after me. Claws ticking. Whisp-thin, and vulnerable. Shivering, slightly, in the wind. I itch my neck again, and shut off comms. Hey. Look. Im sorr- Its fine. He mutters. Eyes down. Claws plastered to his fringe to keep it flat against the wind. I. Um. I I.. I know why you d-dont trust me. And, for a cold instant, I imagine him - chained to the rubble, in a little hole, by his friends. Scared. Unable to move. Explosions shaking bits from broken walls as a damned war goes on outside. Vulnerable. Trapped. I look away. Because did what we had to is the worlds worst excuse. So what if he could be the traitor? So what if The School reprogrammed him? Hes. .my lil adopted brother. .....even if I can''t say it out loud. And he was scared. I rub my neck. Ears drooping. Look. It aint me. Its. His own ears snap flat. Tears welling in the one eye I can see. Nyyya! YES! YES IT- He slaps a hand over his mouth. Grimaces. Shakes. Shudders. Then sobs. "It is....." Look- He drops to all fours, and bolts after Demon. Leaving me alone with the roar of wind.. .and the pain. Behind me, engines thrum as Zippers new Carrier drops off the edge of the road. Into blackness and oblivion. Into lashing dark, and empty void. A spark of blue cubes beside me. Hey, mate. You gonna be okay? Zips avatar hesitates when I blink at him. "And, uh, is he? Like?" No. Not really. I stare up into nothing for a second. Not at all. Not until were a bloody family again. Not.. This. Whatever this is. And.. Zip looks away. It aint you, mate. Its Like, its what They did to us. Yknow?" The School. He wont say it. But thats who he means. ".....like. turned us against each-other. Right?" Right. I mutter. Silences and storm billowing up the street behind me. Zip. Yeah? Gimmie a second. Alright? The avatar glances at the dark, metallic, shape of Polybius hanging beside me. Ominous on a level thats almost Biblical. Yeah. Uh. Sure, like. Well catch up.. He vanishes, and I stare off into the dark. The Machine Mind ticking, quietly, beside me. Vast, and calculating. A moment to breathe, and I look at it. What are the odds Tufty''s the traitor? The real odds? Gears stare at me with their metal eyes. I suspect Tuftys loyalty depends on your loyalty. It says, after a stalled moment. I blink. It doesnt. Thats.. it? I turn, fully, toward it. Tail swiping the wet air. Ycant.. I flick my hands. No. I blink. No? You seek the true, mathematical, odds he will betray you. It states. And so you wish for me to calculate every variable. To reduce a child to factors in an equation. Producing, for you, a neatly packaged number. A cold percentage. A one-in-something chance. An indicator that he is, or is not, your traitor. I look away. Ashamed. Itd help. No. It would not. The Machine Mind states without a shred of inflection. All such numbers are illusions. Fabrications. False divinations of the unknown, and unseen. Divided, neatly, into quantified packages of pseudo-knowledge. What? My head tilts. The Machine clatters its gears, in subtle thought. Imagine if I gave the odds as one-in-seven. A number plucked from the air. What would this tell you?" "I.... I dunno. There''s....." "Would it help you, when you lie awake at night? Thinking of your adopted brother-" I cringe and look away. "-as a dice in mid-roll? Wishing and hoping you knew which number was poised to fall? And which was the lethal digit? It stares at me for a long second. Utterly unblinking. Would this help? No.. I shiver. I guess not. No. It would not. The mechanical thing confirms, numbers drifting in twisted grids and rings. But now imagine you discover the truth. The real answer. Would you then know if the odds given to you were accurate or genuine? I stare at it, for a long moment. No. Not really. Then you should not ask me. It states, simply. Especially as the only true way to know would be- It''s my turn to snap No. And I shake a gleaming claw to go with it. You listen to every God-damn thing we say n do.. But I aint havin you poke about in our bloody brains. The die is thrown in the dark, then. It states. And you must make peace with that. I look away. I look back. And Badger? Is he okay? The cause of his memory-loss remains unknown. It states with no emotion at all. His mental implants report no signs of concussion, trauma, or tampering. And we trust that? No. It repeats. However, I will continue to monitor his health for other issues. Thanks.. I take a step, and pause. What about you? Any progress? Eerie clockwork stills against the storm. You. Dont gotta talk about it. Yknow? The silence ratchets onward. But. My core systems are still fractured. It says with the same cold precision. They cannot tell me who or what I am. You got theories, though. Right? Silence. "Right?" More silence. Endless and unmoved. Whats your oldest memory? Activation. It states. One year. Nine months. Eleven days. Ten hours. Sixtee- That aint what I asked. I poke it. You said before - theres other stuff. Older stuff. Weirdo-freaky-creepy shit that- I do not pursue those memory archives. It cuts me off. Damaged nodes are dangerous to my core integrity. Which means youve tried. I grin. So go on. It would not help. The Machine Mind states. I cannot tell if the records are real, or simply illusions. Fragments of movies, perhaps. Humour me. My ear flicks. Quick. I hear em comin back. Polybius hangs there, silent. Almost still. A chill rising up my back, from my tail, that has nothing to do with the storm. I witnessed The End. The. End. of what? I breathe. Everything. What every- I start, but the thing beside me folds up, in on itself and vanishes. Imploding, like the heart of a star. As if it was never there at all. > > >< < < >> A Decent Of Fools >> A Decent Of Fools Rain burns the sweat from my skin. The dirt from armour. The blood from my hood. The City cleansing us of itself, as I step from cover. Diving, fully, into the endless eruption of water. The rage of The Endless Storm, blasting inward from the utter end of the street. In seconds, every inch of skin and fur and armour is pouring with torrents of spray. Wind sheering water from tarmac to batter me again and again. Blasting through fingers, legs, teeth, and toes. Snatching my arms. Plucking my strings, in an endless symphony of madness that rises to roar across the whole of The City. It batters me back, and I grit myself against it. "WOOO!!!! LETS GO!!! HOT CHOCOLATE!!! YEAH!! Badger cheers and leaps, back in the sheltered nook, as the wind roars up louder and louder. Legs peddle the air as Kami yoinks him back, and Demon fights to insert the hyperactive dingus back into his tissue-thin plastic coat. Arms (and coat) flailing wildly in the air. Tufty, meanwhile, having actual sense, simply clicks a necklace toggle - plastic flowing down his chest to form a second mac. Complete with neat little peaks for his feline ears. He stretches it down to his knees, scooping his tail up inside as it basically shrink-wraps to his body. It''s not a lot, but it''ll have to do. "At least somebody''s with it." I mutter, storming back into cover as our furious [Sniper] snatches a giggling one-handed idiot. Stuffing him directly into the coat - head-first, legs kicking in the air. There''s a struggle, and Badger pops free. Limp sleeves flapping cheerfully as he runs happy circles around us - merrily cackling, and spinning. "YEEAAAAHHH!!! Hot chocolate! Hot chocolate!" "Not if I throw you off the bloody building!" Kami roars as the kid''s coat gets repurposed as a superhero cape for the eleventh time in eleven minutes. "Badger." I sigh. "Coat. On. Properly. Or no hot anything." "But! But! Spooooook!!!" He deflates. ""Naaaawwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!!!" Which is when Kami tackles him in a spidery mess of arms, legs, and Badgery flailing. One aggressive re-coating later - this time with duct tape - we lurch out of our little side-nook. Battering our way out into the roaring wind and horizontal rain. Tufty instantly staggered back as it hits us fully - funnelled down the broken street. But even that feels sheltered as we make it to the opening. Its a nightmare out there. Apocalyptic. And were not even near the pad yet. Just the street ringing the edge of the tower. Ancient, plastic, trees whipping horribly in the hurricane winds. Torn leaves humming in the massive swell of the typhoon. Every instant threatening to blast us upwards - into that vast, thunder-struck, abyss of a storm with no sky behind it. No stars. No Sun. And I half think Kamis right - that they''re all just Fairytale things, made up for stupid kids like me. That the only things twinkling, up there in the sky, are Pirate airships.... And the lights of The Other City. The inverted one. I see it only in glimpse in snatches - as shadows, and windows. As vast shapes, jutting from the belly of The Storm. A million jutting spikes of great glass towers, ripping trails in the thunderous clouds as gales and torrents blow them ever on and on. Like bejewelled and glittering stalactites, so massive press their jagged weight upon your very soul. As if they might drop at any second. We flee to the grim shadow of the ''Arrivals'' building, its rotted car-lifts howling at us in terror of the tempest. Around its edge I catch giddy flashes of the landing zone - far beneath us. A darkened mess of ripped-open ships thatll never fly again. All looted, broke open, and pounded to rotten death by the rain.. But beyond its edge.... A broken morass of dead towers, tilted as if against the storm. Every window festering with nightmares. Swarming with things that''ll eat you all up. Every wall overgrown with monstrous vines, bulging with eyes that squint - half-shut - against the storm.... Welcome to The Quarantine Isolation Zone. The QIZ. From this far inside, you could imagine it sprawls forever - in every direction. Scattered with Pirate megaTowers - all spun together into one by a massive web of skyBridges, hulking ships, and swooping ribbons of monoRail track. Every bit of it shattered to shimmering blurs by the pouring rain-streaked fog of my visor. And beyond even that.... Beyond the vile and clawing dark..... Beyond the sensor-blocking fields and illusions of Karrak.... It''s just a glimpse. A blade of broken light, crossing the horizon. Staining a wide streak of startling neon across the vast ink of our underground world. But it is beautiful. Its edges a-sparkling in every shade, beneath the wild and impossible Storm... Little more than a quieting shiver of colour - painted against the backdrop of a vast, thunderous, Night that will never.... ever.... end.
Neodine :: City District Population: 2.225 Billion
Wind wrenches at me again, as if to carry me away. To hurl me up, and then plunge me down in the vast - black - nothingness beyond the megaTower. But I hunker down tight. Shutting my eyes. Hammering my breath, back, under tight control. Old, old, nightmares rising from the inky core of my soul. "Right. Where''s that lift?" I yell over the horrendous cacophony of artificial weather. Tail sloshing, horribly, in a puddle as I turn to the others. Who all wince and look away. "Come on, it''s gotta be around here some...." And there it is. Or, rather, there it was. A whole bank of doors, with shining brass doors and scrolling filigree buttons. Shooting you down to into the curved belly of the ancient ''Arrivals'' Lounge, overlooking the pad itself, for a simCoffee and a croissant. But that was hundreds of years ago, or more. Now its nothing. A shell. A scarred up, ripped-open, void. Gutted. Empty. Its carriages long fallen, into the rotting depths of oblivion. An ink that calls me. Drags me. Into the clanging darkness Oh! Hey! Theyre broke. Zip laughs. Yeah uh.. My eyes wrench toward him, burning a glare into his glowing avatar. They are, huh? I growl into the wind - trusting my comms implant to pick up the sound. The lifts you said you were leading us to? Uhhhhhh.. Yeaaah? "Which you scouted?" My one ear peaks up. "With your army of drones?" "Hahah....." Zip pulls a cringing wince. "I guess, like....?" He tails off in the face of my livid glare. So....." My eyes narrow and tilt toward Kami - who looks away suddenly. Then Demon, who shrugs helplessly. "No lifts..... I ain''t gonna like this. Am I? You''re gonna try an'' talk me into doin something crazy.... ain''t ya.? I pause, ear half-cocked. Eyes flat. Ain''t? Ya? The others look guilty. "Um. Like.... No?" Stutters my designated scapegoat. "Um like yeah. Unless ya planning on ''roping it'' down the side?" Well. Kami flips me an appraising look. I''ve still got a crapton of duct-tape left over..... Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings. "MMMPH!!!" Badger huffs. Picking at his face. "Hey! Don''t even bloody joke about that. You know I don''t like height-" I shake it off, take a deep breath. One of many, I''m sure. And then I look up. "Okay. What''s the real plan? C''mon." Zipper makes a weird face. Stairs, mate. Stairs? My brows pinch. "What stairs? There ain''t any stairs ''cept..... My eyes go wide. "No....." Oh yes. Kamis eyes flicker with glee. Cmon. Lets put Spook out of my misery..... Hey!? What-! I yelp as she grabs my arm, dragging me through thick puddles. Oh no.. Partly shielded by the dead and rotted Arrivals hub, I meet my nemesis. A rusted, clanking, horror-show of a staircase. Rickety, and writhing in the wind. Swaying one way, then bashing itself back into the concrete wall - where once it was bolted. Ancient metal struts calling out to me with wretched groans and gnawing scrapes. The whole thing an instant from ripping free, and toppling. Smashing and crashing, down into the dark I fixate on it. On the fear. On the void. Lips working, in silence. "Hah, sorry mate. Zip chuckles nervously. But, like, I looked all along the promenade bit...... And, yeah, you oughta see the other ones. Yknow? Theyre, uh..... way worse? He catches my look, and winces harder. Like..... way, way, worse? Missing big bits, worse?" Yep! Surprise! Its the only safe-ish way down. Kami deadpans, thunder roaring behind her as the wind pelts in. Her comms-voice not raising in the slightest. Now cmon. It''s wet. And I want a bloody hot drink too. Safe!? I ask, very seriously. Are you nuts? Yeah. A little. She concedes, waggling a metal finger at her ear. But its that or rappel down the lift-shafts. My ears go, somehow, flatter. Noooooooooooooo? Pity. The shafts are a lot safer. Well. Except for the flesh eating critters. Oooh!! Where!? Badger cheers, tape flapping as he rushes to take a look. Leaning right into the shaft. Yah! WOOO!! That one''s got a MILLION eyeballs! And its waving at me!! He gasps in a very pleased voice, as Demon hauls him away from the edge. Huuuu!! No fair! I wasnt gonna HURT IT!!! I just wanted to see!!! Spook. Look. I know it sucks. But its late. I. We hurt all over. And we all want to sleep. Kami says, in a relentlessly reasonable voice, as Demon claw-kicks weird hairy things back down the shaft. You. You need to get over this heights thing. I do, do I? I grumble. Knowingly defensive. Well you need to jump off a cliff! Oh look! Theres one! I gesture at the lifts. Which wave back. Hop to it! Her eyes glint. Dont tempt me. Id bring you along. We could be bestest rappel buddies. Woo! Rappel buddies! Badger cheers, waggling an angry carnivorous toadstool. YAH! WAIT! I didnt bring mine!! Hence the stairs. Kami tosses him a weary five-armed shrug. The dead sixth shuddering. I cant babysit you and Spook going down the pipe. Babysit. I repeat, receiving a condescending pet-pet. Oh yes. Youd be absolutely adorable if you werent our damn boss. She teases, tiredly. Gee. Thanks. I snark in my least-cute voice. Precious! Knock it off! I snort, knuckle-swiping her back. "Make me! She scoffs. Now cmon. You gonna conquer this bastard, or what?" I flash fangs, and glance away. Yeah, look, Id bleedin try it. But-" We all duck as something dreadful and slimy goes flopping overhead - Tufty leaping away from it with a frantic ''yeep!''. Clutching his tail under the coat, like hes worried itll slither off. Much like the slimy thing. Which does just that. Spook. Im getting absolutely soaked. So are you with us, or not?" Kami droops her arms. Clearly losing patience. One hand clamped to her side. "Please. Zip looked everywhere. It''s a total bust. Everything else is rotted to scraps. Every lift. Every staircase. They even took the damn buttons." She drops her arms. "Only other option is the Toll Lifts back at the Core. But somebody wasted all our money on food. I glance away. Crap. But every time I look at that staircase my gut does a flip. Its one thing to say youll do it. Another to.. Zip nudges a virtual elbow through my chest. Yeah, uh. better hurry mate. Storms getting worse. And, uh, like. other things too.... He adds as Demon rescues a tiny, terrified, fifty-legged crab-thing from Badger - tossing it back down the hole. Right. Right. I growl. Staring up at the death-trap staircase. "Look. You know I''m tryin'', but this is..... It''s bloody hard for me." Fine. Her eyes glimmer. How about a bribe, then? Were outta snacks. I falter as she pops the taser off her armour. What.. The bribe is I dont shock your ass. She grins, sparking it off with a nasty snap. I yelp, and jump - skidding backward. Hot shit.!? Are you. S-serious? Her smile is ever-so evil. I dont know. She leans in. Lets find out. Kami.!!!! I yelp, backing up toward the monster mosh-pit. You know Ive been meaning to test this." She purrs, a crack of ozone blasting away on the storm. "Any volunteers? She glances down. Oh look! Tufty gives a tiny Yeeeep!, and vanishes down the wet steps in wild blur of green. Bounding on all fours, and skidding at the corners. Stumbling, almost drunkenly, with his shrink-wrapped tail. YAH! Wait for meeee!!!! Badger yells, hopping about and waving a severed tentacle. His head spinning between me, the chaos, and the fled cat. Not sure who to stick with. I stare after. Wide-eyed. Yikes. He really went down there. Some of us have better priorities. She shrugs. Now. Thats one down - whos next? Dammit, Tufty.. I storm toward the storm-soaked steps. Taking a deep, shaky, breath. This. it''s really the only way down? No yankin'' me ass-ornament? They nod. I grit fangs, and shudder. Dragging myself toward the steps. Crap. Well. If I gotta die to some death-trap, Ill do it on my own damn terms.. OOOOOH! ILL HELP! Badger rascals back to offer me a gross, slimy, appendage. And, no, I dont mean his hand. I fend him off, with a twitching eye. No. Im gonna do this on my own, squirt. I dont need no help. I glare at Kami. Or bloody encouragement, neither.. YAH! But. But the power of FRIENDSHIP!! He wails in true horror, waggling the severed monster limb. Power o my foot up yo jack-end, more like. But I shoot him a near smirk. Hes trying, in his own way. But my mouth narrows as I tilt back toward my doom. Okay.." I whisper to myself. "Deep breaths.. Deeeep breaths.. Get it done, quick, before ya can think. I touch a foot to the cool, thick, layers of rust. and it crunches, like fat cornflakes. My heel sinking in, as the entire freaking structure shifts beneath my pad. Dragging one leg away from the other, with a wracking moan. Every bone I have juddering as the lethal structure smashes right into its anchoring bolts. Knocking them just that little - tiny - bit more loose. My eyes go huge. Not safe! Not safe! I stutter, very bravely, as Badger gaily prances down the pouring-wet steps. Whooping and jumping, and flapping that gross tentacle - like hes singing in the rain. Noooooo! STOP IT! Come back! Which is when Kami gives me a helpful little nudge from behind - sending me skittering, right onto the mad thing. I stumble. Steps blur. And I land flat on all fours, at the first landing. Tail bristling. Ears back. Confronted - suddenly - by the blistering, rain-slashed, nothingness beyond and beneath the steps. A void that rips claws into my guts. Dragging them down. Down. Downdowndown- No. No, no, no. I backpeddle into Kamis legs, and spin. Snarling. I said Ill do it on MY terms! You bitch! Her gaunt face flickers with guilt, and she relents. Look. Im just. It was a joke. Okay? I was just trying to. help? You were, huh? Its just.. That storms getting worse, and- Her breath heaves, a little pained. Hands grabbing at girder as everything sways. I hiss something unspeakable. Zip winces at her. Hey, Kam. mate, like.. you sure this aint going too far? She hesitates. I just want to fix this damn phobia. Youre! Making! It! Worse! I force through fangs as my eyes twist toward that dark, roaring, pit beneath the steps. Claws gouging through flaking metal. Kami winces, and Demon grips her arm. Zip blocking her way, too, for whatever thats worth. Zpook must do zis. Alone. Or it is worth nothing. He says, limping ahead down the steps. Breath hard. Limp tail bumping down the steps. Yeah. I shudder. I WILL DO IT! My defiant shout torn off into a yelp as the stairs shift beneath me. Her face crumples. Fine. Fine. Just.. please. hurry up.. She says in such a bleak tone that I feel the pain in it. My eyes slip beside her, to a glass-eyed Demon. His back is straighter than the stairs, but his arms sag. His head low. Maybe I should have helped with the damn monsters.. Instead of being so.. self involved. I stare down at my twitching hands, clenched to the metal. Take another long breath. And start picking my way down. Bit by bit. Hand, and foot, and gripped-tight claw. Badger races back to support me again - because a goopy one-handed dingus is the best crutch. But I grab the railings instead. Which wobbles like a bust tooth - lurching me, out, toward oblivion. But I swallow, I shut my eyes, and I just keep feeling my way down onto the next step. Groping my way with clutching hands and grabbing toes. The metal damp and flaky against my skin, as water sprays in from the exposed side. Groans and screeches rattling up through the structure as it leans away from the wall again - slamming back, with a jaw-breaking crash. Every bolt wobbling, frantically, in its hole.. Keep going. Youre doing good. Kami calls down from above, in a far softer tone. I take another step, and something goes ting-ga-tink-a-tink off into the night. Causing a few low whimpers from someone I wont name. Come on. Just six flights down to the pad. Slowly, it becomes five. Then four. Faster and easier all the time, though the tower-high structure warps beneath me. The steps themselves creaking, almost breaking, as I step on them. Water pouring down through slats and steps above. The night outside a blank roar of rain and wind, pressing in on us from behind the Arrivals hub-tower. Its not much of a shield. But its enough. Until the metal begins to thrum. And then to shake. I hug a step and hiss as the staircase rattles itself into a frantic blur. Shocked into motion by the tram carving a sudden, raging, river of light across the dark beneath. Right along the inner edge of the platform itself. Not even stopping. Its gone just as quick. The retreating streak of windows little more than a flapping tongue of mockery in a broke-toothed mouth. Flashing its light across ruined shops and homes from better days. Even a cobbled market ripped apart by time and scavengers - with paint cracking off plastic timbers. Inhuman eyes flicker in reflection. Mutants and GMOs like me - but not. There, and gone, in the dark. Wild, and nameless, and less than animal. With shadowy tendrils, stark against the walls. Things that arent hands. Things that arent faces. Shrinking back from the light. And, for just a second, I wonder how our world came to be like this.. But after that moment of madness, the rest is almost easy. A few more turns, and I tumble out onto rough tarmac. Onto solid, beautiful, ground - lashed by pouring rain. Giggling in frantic and hideous relief as Badger whoops and claps all round me. Yelling about how great I am, and how he was cheering Team Spook all the ways down. Grabbing Tufty in a crushing hug. And maybe he was. Maybe it was all lost to vicious wind. Carried out to the distant lights of The City. Or maybe Im so pathetic I- I snarl, mentally, and shake off the pity-party. It never helps. Not really. Ive just gotta fix this. This fear. Before it gets us all killed. I stand, shaken but proud, and stare out into the writhing storm. The thunder. The rain. The chaos and maelstrom. Plastic bags slapping past at half the speed of sound. One final push, and were there. "Time to get go home." I breathe, and the sky whites with fire. Shadowing the vast bulk of a wrecker ship against the mad expanse of the storm..... ....and the inverted City, hanging above it..... >> The Night Tyrant >> The Night Tyrant
## WARNING :: Storm Surge has reached level [Extreme] ## [High] likelihood of damage to neoSoviet property!
Oceans of water sheer off the sides of Zippers floating Carrier as the megalithic typhoon crashes off its sides. Blasting under its hull, to slam its weight into our ankles. Every drop impacting like a bead of glass. We hunker against the rear as wind and rain blast off the edges of our armour. Ripping at cloaks and tails like vicious hands. Tearing at the clingfilm coats on Badger and Tufty. Drumming our suits with impatient fingers, itching to work their way in. Our new toy wails and rocks. Artificial weather testing its quantum grip on the landing pad. Knocking it into a near-skid or spin as as we chase it out past the curving glass of Arrivals. Past windows lit by eerie lights, and unholy flowers - twisted, and wrong. Lit by strange fronds. Shifting as we pass. Covered in eyes. In teeth. In blood. The building ends, and the brutal crosswind hits like ten tons of wrecking ball - slamming us all to the side. Hammering us down. Blasting us, bone-deep, with rain as it tries to shear us right off the megaTower itself. I fire my remaining grapple at the Carrier, and it unfurls into a sticky web - plastering the side. Demon hooking his rappel line to Badger and Tufty, as the roar deafens us all. The former spinning and getting tangled. The latter cat hunkering beside him. Shivering. Gripping the gritty landing-zone with shaking claws - and his lurid fringe too. I throw a glance back up at the Pirate megaTower, rising endlessly above us. Vast as a finger of God, but rotten all the way to its core. Once beautiful. Once gleaming. A symbol of hope, fallen to the dark. Transformed into a monument to chaos, and colour. To madness, and lawless insanity.. "HEY CMON, IDIOT!!" Kami yells back at me, as the Carrier jinks further away. Exposing me to the wild night. My line tugs, and I hurry back into its meagre shadow. Kami herself yelping as her cracked helmet starts to malfunction in the rain. Sizzling, shuddering, and coming a little undone. Yaaah!! Is Kami okay!? Badger yells up as her hands clamp to it. Armoured plates twitching, limply, as water fries the delicate internals. Wafting nasty smoke, as the whole helmet starts to unfold on her. Sliding off her head, and tangling in her hair. Reducing her to a huffing, growling, mess of stringy braids and limp plastic bits. None of which is helped by me yelling HAH! SERVES YA BLOODY RIGHT, TASER TITS!!! as she peels the jerking, dying, mess off her head. Smugly safe and cosy beneath my own, perfectly sealed, helmet. Oh, I can fix that! She screams, stabbing through settings on her HUD. What. Kami. What are ya- I yelp as my own helmet deactivates, throwing off my hood and utterly soaking my hair. Splattering it to my face, and everything. YOU ABSOLUTE- I shriek as Demons hood flies open too, his own helmet crawling off his horns in folding layers. HA! NOW EVERYONES WET! She cackles, gleefully. YOU- I scream. Panting and fumbling the override - which Im suddenly locked out of. YOU ABSOLUTE- Yah! Its okay, Spook!! Ill get soggy too! Badger yells hurling his coat up into the wind, which whisks it into the night. The nutty lil dumbass whooping and streaming with water. Cackling wildly up at the storm as his puffball hair unravels down over his eeys and neck. We all stare at him. Blinking. Well.. I groan, grabbing my hood and holding it on tight. At least somebodys happy.. Hey, Demon! How about a trade? Kami smirks. Waggling metal hands. "My cloak, for your helmet." Demon looks a little lost for a moment. Zha? His eyes flick to all of us. Almost startled. His jaw works for a second. Then he blinks. Cloakz? Golden claws twitching beneath his own, as it flies and flaps around him. Yes! My cloak! Remember!? From the battle? Kami grits through the endless explosion of wind and rain slapping her hair about. She pushes herself closer to the truck, and shivers. Come on! You didnt lose it, did you!? OOOO!! Yeah! He definitely did!! Badger yells, super helpfully. Getting a bop on the top for his trouble. None o that. I growl. Demon pats his empty armour. Ah. I am. sorry. The battle? It. His eyes drift away. Lost, somehow, in the gales of wind and madness. As if the thought itself were blown away..... Uh. Mate? You okay? Zip spins upside-down, peering at him from above. Tired. Demon mutters to nobody - turning to press onward, into the dark. A twitch shooting up his arm, as he twists at his hood. You. should have zis. He doesn''t look back at her. Kami hesitates, eyes wide and puzzled - but I shake my head rapidly. Zip making X signs in the air. She gives us the finger, but I mouth the words "Don''t. Please." And she simply growls, quietly, shooting me an explain later look as she folds all her arms. No. Thanks. I dont- I don''t need it. She snipes an odd look at me, through the rain. ..its got horn holes in weird places. But Demon doesnt seem to hear. His eyes distant. Off in whatever world consumes him. Slowly, he turns to stare back the way we came, toward the distant fight. Tail twitching as he fights to keep that hood over his mask. Clutching it protectively. Rrrgh.. It''s wet! Come on! I yell, fighting to keep my own hood - and failing hilariously. My cloak blasted up over my head, whipping around it, like a flag. Badger leaps on it, and holds tight. Utterly soaked to the skin, and loving every moment. Tufty, now, the only semi-dry person for half a mile. All sealed up snugly in his high-tek plastic poncho. Hugging his perfectly dry tail. I forge onward, dragging my tiny dork brigade behind, as we press toward cover beneath the massive wrecks. Hoping to block out the hammer-blunt winds. But the madness is only getting worse. SHIT!! We gotta get into wind-cover! Come on! I scream as the typhoon takes us as a personal bloody challenge. Knocking me suddenly flat, and dragging Tufty half-off to meet ducking Poseidon! With Badger along for the ride! Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there. Demon slams down on the line, and I stomp it. Giving the cat a chance to claw his frantic way back to us. Every second gust lifting him off the damn floor, in spits and bobs. Dee grabs the kid, and I we absolutely leg it. Abandoning the carrier, and hitting all fours, for a wild face-scouring panic-run across the pad. Kami staggering along behind, screaming furious gibberish, as the storm surges again. Rain beating every bit of skin, and face. Thudding my ears like a canvas roof, as the howl of hurricane wind rips them and my tail this way and that. As if some monstrous thing above is reaching down to peel us all right off the freaking megaTower. Were losing the Carrier! Kami yells, as we find a loose wreck to stop at. Its getting bloody owned out here! Zipper! I yell. Stuff keepin us together! Get it into the deeper ruins! Lotsa metal! Block it in! Right, mate! Badger!! Tufty mews as the other kid goes tumbling end over ass. Forcing Kami to leap on the line, and haul him back. Demon drops Tufty - who scampers to me, hunkering and hugging my leg in terror. Clutching his fringe, tight flat, as Demon saves Badger. Dragging the kid back, to latch onto me too. "I bangled my face up." He whispers. I can''t tell if he''s crying in the rain. Hey. Hey. I stutter. But look away. Youll do, alright? Youll.. Youll do. Okay Spook. He sniffles again, reaching for a hug I cant give. Hey..... Cmon! It ain''t far now! We gotta. We gotta go alright? I choke. Wishing I had some way to comfort him. Just.... anything..... "You''ll be okay....." "Okay Spook....." He sniffs. And the others grab a kid each as we claw our way toward the largest wreck in sight. Dodging fists of wind and wet that slam our sides and faces. We''re almost there, when a massive surge slams me right into the tarmac. It flips me again. Again. And I panic-fire my one remaining grapple into the mad whirl of floor and dark and rain - hitting nothing at all. Demon grabs my ankle. Hauling me to Kami - who has gone full spider on the tarmac. Tufty is down again - tumbled at speed across the pad. Flailing. Breathless. His raincoat catching wind, like a damn kite. Curled around hands that hug that fringe, like keeping it flat is worth more than his life..... Grab the line! Both hands! I scream at Tuft as the gale batters him again. Both! I-I-I- cant- He yelps as Demon rushes in to snatch our paper-thin cat with one arm - Badger still wrapped to the other. Golden hair snapping behind him, as we force ourselves into the shadows of the massive wrecks. Mighty cruisers torn open like pinatas. Great broken rusters, fighters, and cargo-haulers spilling their metal guts onto the pad. Plunging into the ruined hold of the rusting cargo-hauler. Blinding rain and rage and madness replaced by shadows that.... scuttle. And tiny lights still flickering, dimly, up in the dark above. Leaving the rain to slash, viciously, at the door. Like a maniac with a knife, that knows it can''t get you. Until you come out..... There we huddle, gasping and heaving, as the monster drums its sharpened raindrops on hull. A very damp Tufty clambering, sloppily, onto Demons back. Raincoat torn. Clothes soaked. Clutching the older boy''s horns with wet fingers, and shivering. One hand still pressed, firmly, to that gleaming-wet fringe of dark green hair.... None of us mention it. Not such a non-soggy moggy now, are yah? I chuckle in crazy, adrenaline-rocked, panic. Flicking drops off my ears and tail as the ruins drip and scurry around us. He lets out a small, sad, mewl. Shivering gently. Hey. You ain''t alone, kitt. Feels like Im bloody drowning from the inside-out.. I agree, very softly, as Kami squeezes out her braids. And I know better than to argue over the helmets, with the storm-slammed wreck moaning above us. Wailing. Screaming. Demons hurt. Kami wheezes. Staring directly at me. You carry the traitor, I''ll carry Badger. We''ll run for it. What? I jerk back. Shocked into a whole-body shiver. Schooling myself back into calm. "Stop callin'' him a bloody traitor. Kami. We don''t kn-" "It''s not far now. Mostly under cover." She promises, ignoring my lame retort. "But that cat will never make the open parts." Dees fine. Hell be fine. I state, with slippery eyes. It aint far now. Hes not fine. Kami snaps. And hell never say it. Dont you understand? Hell drop dead before- Guilt fills me. Words forcing their way up my mouth. The kid weighs as much as a damn cheese-slice. And the bloody storm knows it.. Spook. Kami snaps. But Demon raises a hand. Tail twisting, numbly. Weakly. Yah! Its okay! Ill do it! I''ll carry him!! Badger flexes what could, very charitably, be called muscles. Im strong too! Heh. Yeah, sure, ya dork. I snort as he flails his way over to Tufty, and tries to scoop the cat onto his back. Not helped at all by Tufty not wanting to go. But Kami pulls them apart. Shooting me a look. "It''s up to you Spook. You''re the leader." And doesn''t that just make it harder? "I..... Kami....." I cant drag both. She hisses. Paler that normal, in the dim light. Demon is even worse - borderline zombie. Eyes stuck on nothing, as cold shudders lash through him. Classic [battleStim] blowback. My fault. Okay..... I. I grip my face. Sudden anger ripping through me. Aimed inward. Directly at myself. All my bloody resolve roaring back in a flood. Alright..... Fine..... Ill. Ill. c-carry Tuft- Lets just..... let''s..... bloody go. And. Um.. Tufty whispers, ducking back as we turn to stare. What? Um..... I. Ill be okay. He slips off Demons back, and shivers. Hugging the grapple locked to his thin chest. It''s.... it''s only the wrecks now..... Ill.. Ill..... No.... I will carry.... Demon forces out, at last, and the shame starts stabbing me in the guts. "Um.... nooo.... It''s okay... if me and Badger work-" Tufty stutters to him, in a low whisper. But we''re all on comms. "No." Kami snaps. "You keep away from him.... you little psycho....." Tufty''s ears droop low, and he sniffs. Staring at his toes as the tears begin. But Kami''s eyes are hard. "No. Don''t you dare. Don''t you play that-" "Kami-" "Spook. Please..... It''s his favourite trick.... Don''t fall for it....." She whispers. Almost begs. "He''s done it before. He did it right before he ki-" "Kami. Shut it." I get up. Cracking out my back. "Everybody bloody quiet." "What-" "No arguing." I snap. "Kami. You deal with Badger. I''ll carry Tuft." What. Kami states. Not even a question. I take a long breath. "Just..... climb on my back. Don''t say nothin''. I ain''t.... I''m.... just do it." I turn around, and there''s silence. Then, soft steps. A little snuffle. And something agile and quick leaps up on my back, clinging to my shoulder. Every part of me, tenses. Locking tight. But I pass my rappel line to Kami, and she ties... my passenger. on tight. Alright then." I grunt, eyeing the roaring wall of wet and slamming wind. Spook. Tufty starts. But I shake my head. Cmon. Let''s go. Ain''t far now..... We stagger back down the titled deck, fighting our way back - out - into the roaring maelstrom. Distant lights flickering shadows between the vast, immovable, beasts of iron and rust. And then we run for it. Crossing the blazing wind-tunnels in a crazy diagonal hopscotch dance-fight vs the storm. Into the wrecks, and along tilted halls. Out again, just as quick. Ducking between massive bulkheads, and under fallen loaders. A cry of joy ringing up as our rain-battered faces spy our landing-zone - a massive clutter of dead ships marking the way in. Pad Nineteen welcomes us in with big, grim, rusty arms. Its sign slamming endlessly against the fence. I barrel us through the opening, into the narrow hole in a wreck. Up through the shattered cockpit, we go. Grappling flight-chairs, and consoles, as we fight our way up the slick slope - pouring with water. Out, onto the back of a cargo speeder - and down. Into our secret, Pirate, cove...... We spill out into a quieter, calmer, night. The tyrannical maelstrom suddenly, sharply, neutered by mountain-high walls of metal. A ring of bloated wrecks that cup our little hidey-hole like massive hands around a flame. Themselves entrapped in a web of gigantic wind-shields. Bulkheads. And more. Shielding it from the night. The rain still falls, endless and insatiable. A torrential brick-shower of water, drumming my hair and taping my ears. But suddenly, I barely feel it. Slowly we get up, and I lose Tufty without a word. The small cat sliding down, quietly, to land with a pat I barely even hear. Like it never happened at all. Right? Like it..... My fists clutch, and I shiver. Ggrurrgh. Kami spits. Ive been less soaked in the damn bath.. Eh. Thats okay. I grin, shakily. I got a cure. I paw a chunky button on my armoured bracer, and something thuds the empty - windswept - nothingness of the barren landing zone. An echo of sound. A pulse felt only in the bones. A scrap of darkness, shimmers. A crack of dim neon light, cutting itself into empty air itself. Widening. Brightening. The rainstorm shivers. Glitches. And there it is - a door built of nothing but wind and pounding rain, sliding open. Revealing a hole in the empty air. A dark cavern of plastic, rubber, and fabric., suspended on nothing. Lights and controls waking up as I breathe a terrible sigh of relief.
## Night Tyrant :: [Online]
> > >< < < >> One With The Machine >> One With The Machine
## [Pilot] Acknowledged ## Engine Systems :: [Online] ## Drone Combat Systems :: [Online] ## Primary Weapons Systems :: [Online] ## Secondary Weapons Systems :: [Online] ## Initiating :: Pre-flight Diagnostics ## Awaiting [pilot] commands..
The razor-thin edge of the stealth-field burns with layers of folded light. A sandwich of images, floating atop halos of roaring golden energy. Each hovering above an open, golden, eye that burns with flickering radiance. Projecting a fragment of false reality, they hold suspended in the air. An image built of bent light that twists my eyes with fake depth. Fake distance. I grab at the edges of the floating hole, and pull myself up. Into the cockpit of The Night Tyrant. Our very slightly stolen black-ops gunship. Missile systems unfold around me. Weather diagnostics. Jets. Rotating detonation engines. Micro-rocket swarms. The huge machine waking with a great, sub-audible, thrum. Echoes of power vibrating the pads of my fingers and toes. Readouts leaping into the air. Switches and buttons blinking around me as I land my ass in the pilot seat. I tap the controls on reflex, and a huge virtual screen lights up. Holographic crosshairs locking to my eye. Stacking themselves into a tunnel that shifts like a digital snake with every turn of my head. Servos juttering as it shifts the massive, holy-shit, anti-air cannon to point wherever I look. And, the mother of it all, the grand prize. Working heat! I flick a claw toward the door-close switch, leaning back and ready to enjoy- A horribly, hideously, soggy Tufty leaps right into my lap. Shakes himself absolutely everywhere. Mewls, once, in apology. Then scrabbles his rough-footed, pointy-clawed, way over me. Doing terrible things to my precious, PRECIOUS, seat in the process. You-! You little-! I screech as Idiot No #2 lands right on top of me, laughing with hysterical glee. Me, and my cabin, are subjected to a second - more Badgery - shake. And I cop a sopping wet dork to the face as he paws his way after. Kicking the back of my very helmet-free head as he slides into the crew cabin. Ooooh goooody! I moan. Which is when big bulky Demon peers round the door. I boggle at him. I squeak. I shake my head furiously. But he gives me that wan little smile of his, and droops back into the rain. Relief soaking me almost as fully as Tufty. And I almost get the door closed before Kami gets right up in my face. Glaring absolute, capital-offence, Murder-hate at me. Hi.. I lean back. One handed, not breaking eye-contact, she stabs a slider on the controls. Half-opening the main crew door on the side of the Thunder. Thanks. So much. She smiles, sweet as poisoned chocolate. Dropping out, with a wan little wave. Yeah, well! Well! You sabotaged our bloody helmets! I stutter. Slamming the damn door behind her, and melting - downward - into a sloppy, gross, puddle in the footwell. Dimly aware of the bangs and tantrums behind me as they bundle in and slam the doors. Quietly, unerringly, I raise two fingers. Wiggle them a bit. Then, guided by centuries of synthetically-implanted flight-experience, I stab down on the console and woosh the slider all the way. Electing a horrible scream as the doors fly wide and proud - blasting one last woosh of rain, right up her ass. SPOOK!!! YOU-!! YOU-!! SCREW YOU! Kami screeches as a metal arm jams itself over the back of the seat. Swiping madly above - and finding nothing. Tough tits, ya spidery bitch! I yell from the footwell, flipping her a couple of very rude gestures - backwards and upside-down. She makes a noise like engine-failure, right behind me. Stomping. Yelling. Throwing boots. Cursing my linage. I laugh manically. Oh yeah? Dont mess with my bloody helmet then! A stinky clodhopper comes wizzing over the back of the seat, and I laugh even more. Wanging it right back - with gets me a feline yowl, and a Badgery shout of Bullseye!! Ooops.. Uh.. Yeah..... Sorry Tufty? I slide a little more downward as Kami stomps about in the painted cargo area, looking for a way to jangle my bells about. Finally settling on a fully-redundant shriek of Bloody open the MAIN door, too! You idiot! Dont just bloody leave us out there!!! Haha, whoops! I cackle. Which she takes. uhhh. pretty poorly, to be honest. I dive into my HUD settings, and finally get my bloody helmet up. And its just as well I did, cause she detaches that broken arm and starts flailing it about over my head. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. But there aint much she can do to me down here. Well, except flip me off with every remaining hand and storm off - hunting for towels. Which I wish her bloody luck with. Its still bloody soggy from last week. I strip out of my sopping rags and cloak, baring the shining-black custom armour beneath. It gleams in the blinking lights, which shine in its surface like Christmas day.. I let the mushed fabric splat to the floor, along with the rest of my outer gear. Grenades. Guns. Knives. Ammo.. One, moist, ear twitches upright. Kamis gone quiet. Hmmm. I peep around the side of my chair. Yep shes changing.. Guess shes calmed down. Slowly, I ease my way outta the footwell and back into my seat. Hitting a virtual button that causes a rippling shudder through my armour.
## ERROR :: Dominion Armour unlock [failed].
Grumbling furiously, I slap at all of the joints on my suit to loosen them. Ramming the back into the wall, careful of my tail. Then crouch, flex, bend, and- Click. The armour unjams with a shudder. Slick panels stuttering on badly-fitting joints. Locked bolts spinning open as the system realigns its muscle-augmenting servos. These grab parts of the suit, and - jerkily - dissemble it. The spine compacting, as muscle-shaped plates slide off of me in sections. Crawling over my shoulders in waves. Spilling me out in a rubbery, skintight, underlay that gleams with fine gold circuitry.. Ahhhhh, yeah. Thats some good blood circulation. I stretch like a rubber band as the chest-pieces and arms fold up like leaves of paper. Reforming into a weirdly tight package that flips over, like its alive, and scuttles away on the stumps of its arms and legs. Any updates, Pol? Random shards of holo-light above me resemble into a triangular eye. I have upgraded and refined the basic blueprints for the teams armour and weapons." The Machine Mind states, bringing up a new model for our standard kit. The design is mostly the same black, glassy, ceramic-layered plastic. But slicker. Sharper. Faster.... "Tests indicate this will improve speed by 10%, and reducing jamming by 78%. Ballistic resistance has also been enhanced with updated materials. Damn cool." I grin, damply, kicking my feet under the heat. "Can we fabricate it? Unfortunately not. 3D Printer resources are running low. We would have enough for two sets, only. "Dammit.. Money again." I also require more time to upgrade, and adjust, other parameters. Particularly the onboard AI..... I nod along, basking in the cranked-up AC heat blasting my face. Dehumidifiers humming as our heavily-modified bird strips the water from the air to shove it back outside. I squeegee off my wet tail, flicking it up into a languid loop beneath the overclocked heat. Strands of fur parting as the roaring air does its work. I stretch, slowly, in the limited space. Claws grasping air. Vertebra cracking. Then I curl myself up into a cosy ball on the seat, and yawn wider than most humans can manage. Sinking my scrawny ass deep into that fat foam.. Into being the operative word - theres big bloody claw-holes! I groan, furiously, but what can ya do? Least theres still a lot of legroom. Itd be tight for an adult, but.. I doze a little as the heat rolls over me, like the opposite of a bath. Steaming away droplets of water, and soothing the hurt of outside. Mmmm. Feels good after such a long day.. And nothing left to do tonight. Not with that storm battering about overhead. Even packed down, tight, in our hole I can feel The Night Tyrant rocking - quietly - in its throes. "Yeah.... No way were taking off in that...." But I don''t mind. I let the chaos behind me sink into a sleepy haze. A little (moist) wave, and the front vScreen dissolves into blank stealth-grade armour. Shutting off the controls. Dimming the lights. And hiding away the crazy freakin night we waded through. Though I still hear it beating on our hull. Raging and roaring and eager to get in.. But I dont care. I always feel safe in here. I dont know why. Im so terrified of heights out there. but in here? Im untouchable. Which is bloody weird, because flying The Night Tyrant is like balancing a ball on your nose. In a high wind. While some bugger shoots you. And thats when it aint like this out there..... A day when nobodys flying nowhere. My ears twiddle toward the yelling match going on in back. Something about Badger loosing a tiny, angry, mushroom. And, no, I didnt say lose. Hes called Gus!! I dont care! He wants to eat you! I know!!!! Thats why hes AWESOME!!! I tune it out, and doze. Dimming down the lights even more as I slink my way towards dreamland.. Which is, of course, when a huge - nasty, stinky, rancid, ass-flavoured - pile of old towels splatters down on my head. Causing me to scream, roar, curse, and flail as I fight to get em off. Oh gahhhh! NOOOO! Oh, God! No!!!! Its all freakin over me! Oh God!!! Oh God! It''s in my mouth! I can TASTE it!!! I scream as I fight my way towards air. Heaving the huge mess of dank, stinky, goopy grot off me, into the footwell. Sh~lop. Flop. Splut. I bash open the door to kick em out. Plus some nasty, angry, little mushroom thing chewing my arm. (Where the heck did that come from??) Then I rinse myself off, best I can, and snap it shut. Panting hard. Groaning. Shaking. As I sink, slide, and generally splatter my way back down into the footwell. Blurrrrrffffffffff. Youbastard.. Gales of laughter resound, and the monster within me stirs. Slowly. Darkly. My narrowed eyes rising, like vengeful fairytale moons, over the back of the chair. Glaring down at her with terrible wrath. Yreally think ya funny. Dont ya? Y-y- She snorts and howls. Heaving too hard for words. Quite the grand jape. Right? Kami slaps the back of the chair, and howls with glee. Vibrating it horribly. Yknow this is how The Murders start? She flips me off with two left hands, wheezing horribly. Ya got no idea what youve unleashed, is what Im sayin. Go- choke on it-! she howls, finally forcing it out. Ive got video, and video is forever! Reap the apocalypse. I growl, ominously, sinking back into my now-pungent abode. Claws groping under the console. Ripping free a fat, braided, fibreoptic cable. Ysee, theres another reason I feel happy in here. A reason that makes any violation of my little nook a violation of me.. And its not just the flight-chip in my skull - feeding me the instincts of a dozen ace pilots. Or because I say where we go.. .its because the machine is part of me. And I mean that very literally. My hand snakes up, on automatic - dragging the cable to the implant buried in the side of my head. I pop the skull-hatch, and slot it in - with a bone-vibrating CLUNK. That never stops feeling weird, lemmie tell you. Its not just the click that wobbles your whole brain-box, its the feeling of. Being poked deep inside your head, is as good as I can describe it. But I slot the cable, and my body dissolves into metal. Into gears. Into weapons, and sensors, and systems, and engines and POWER. My mind expanding from one small meaty-flavoured shell to fill the entire machine.
## Initiating :: neuroJump ## Connection :: stable.
The cyberworld folds me up in its digital embrace. Wrapping me in wires. Warming me with batteries. Empowering me with engines, and with guns. My new flesh is titanium. My new body is steel. My fingers are wheels, and rotors, and guns. Every part of the machine merging so deeply into my mind that I feel the rain ticking on my hull. My treads gripping the ground. Not a disjointed mess of imagery, like the bar or the Carriers - but alive. With fire and devastation, but a gesture away.. I open my dozens of eyes. And I am The Night Tyrant..... > > >< < < >> Glorious Vengeance? >> Glorious Vengeance?
## Integration :: [Stable] ## Pilot Link :: [Established]
My mind merges with the the machine, and my senses expand. Dozens of vScreens rising around me. Filling my world with blackened images of the rain-scoured dark. I see inside too: my meat-body slumped in its chair. Being awkwardly biological, as it does. And, behind me - lit like a party - is the glowing ovoid of my main crew-cabin. A flat cargo area - strewn with scattered bedding, clothing, crisp-packets, and Badgery nonsense. Plus a large crate at the back, with holes in, that''s currently being used as a table (for more nonsense). And, finally, a pinned-up sheet in the corner. I am everything, in here. A digital god. I am the walls. I am the ceiling. Okay, I am definitely not the chemical toilet. But I am this place. I feel the weight of them walking around. I sense their heat. Their heartbeats. And I can almost fancy Im like Zipper, in here - if nowhere else... And here. "Hey. You." I growl over internal speakers, my voice twisted in every direction. Blocky cubes of wireframe light sticking to my digital fingers, as I reach into the workings of the machine.. "What''s that Spook? Need a towel?" Kami snickers as my internal security systems light up. Wafer flat panels unfolding from the ceiling behind her. Building into a twin-barrelled turret.... "Ya went too far." I growl, as the turret twitches. "Uh huh?" She scoffs. "Come on! What are you gonna do to top that? Huh? Open the door again?" "Oh, I was thinking more about seein'' ya jump out in the rain." "And why would I do that?" She scoffs as the turret swivels to point itself directly at the wall next to her ass. A dotted line projecting the trajectory. "Face it, Spook. I won the Prank War before it even-" A heavy, rubberised, anti-riot ball blasts from the hyper-slick barrel. It slams the wall - ow- and bounces directly into her ass with all the fury of a very, very, very petty Spook. Kami whips upright, and screams absolute bloody mayhem. Staggering hard into one wall, and going totally limp at the knees. SPOOK! YOU- YOU ABSOLUTE...... DRIBBLING.... Serves you right, human fleshthing!! I cackle from the speakers above. Earning a thrown arm. I KNOW WHERE YOU SLEEP! YOU- But thats as far as she gets before I fire again - bouncing a second shot off the back wall. Right into the same bruised spot. Kami loses her goddamned mind. Woah, uh, hey, uh. maybe dont.. uh. I stutter as she unfolds her massive, chunky, rifle. Attaching the barrel extender, and jamming it directly up - into my ceiling-gun. You try that again, and well see what the internal armours like on your damn precious baby! She screeches as her internal railgun booster spits sparks and shimmering heat. Filling the cabin with a low pwwwwweeeeEEEEEEE! of rising power. Uhhh. Kami. Y''know how I said the towels were too far-? This thing has a Slammer Mode, remember? She glares through the blocky scope at me. One. More. Ball. Go on. Ill take the engines clear off your damn toy!!!! And then well bloody see who-!! Theres a nasty, meaty, thonk as a red rubber ball meets tender rump. Kamis eyes widening in shock, amazement, bafflement, and rage. She turns slowly. She looks down. Do it. Badger whispers in absolute glee. Hopping about on his little tosies, and letting off explosive little giggles of excitement. Kami, presented with an easy target, drops her huge gun and tries to strangle an idiot. Chasing him all around the cabin, off the walls, round the edges, tripping over everything in their way. Including Demon, Tufty, and a loose bundle of duvets that yells Yah! Hey! Gerroff!. Spilling furious, blue-haired, emo boy all over the floor. Freed of sleepy warm cocoon, Zipper rises like the wrath of gamers scorned. Virtual controllers, keyboards, and screens rising like stubby wings behind him as a tiny army of bee-sized drones whirl around his head. Flecking her with itty bitty adorable targeting-lasers. Okay, thats new.. Groaning, Zip pushes back the muss of neon blue falling all over his bare back and face. Blinking at us all in confusion, as if he just woke up. Though I''d bet my last vial he was using the main Ops Screen to play some old Battle Royale game called ''Red Zero: Black'' (its apparent primary purpose). Probably vs himself. And himself. And also himself. Kami, who was midway to dunking Badger, face first, into the chemical toilet narrows her eyes. Oh. And look who was all tucked up in here, while we were getting SOAKED! Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Mate? What? Like, it was my turn- He starts, which is when Kami gets right in his face and hisses like a wet stove. My armour is ruined because- "Right. Yeah. And that''s totally my fault! Like, I didn''t even get to go out today!" Zip snaps to cut her off, and they both start shoving. Forgetting me entirely. Mission of vengeance accomplished, I flip away from the chaos. Letting em kettle away in the back as the storm beats itself against my metal skin. Slithering its droplets down my back. The world is a mess, outside. A dozen wrecks looming, large, in rain-sheered dark. My Stealth Shield subtly distorting their shapes. Twisting them. Tinting them eerie colours, and echoing them with shadowy twins. As if their souls are tearing free..... The whole image flickering with thunder beneath the neon light of the pirate tower.. and twitching with subtle, half-seen, movements..... What do you see? Cracks a voice in the back of the dark of the void. And I lift my robotic eyes to the infernal storm. Scouring my lenses with its blinding force. The only beast on scopes tonight is The Kaiju. Fifty-five metrics of leering gunship, built to rob the great Aristo pleasure barges that dare to drop below the belly of The Great Storm. Just the kind of bruiser to turn its nose into the wind, and ignore it all night long. Riding its thumping ionic thrust compactors, and shimmering grav repellers. Distant. But dont be fooled. They got eyes on everything out here. But were kids, hiding in holes. And they probably cant detect us. Well, I hope. I lie back, floating in nothingness, and open my hands. Glowing control-systems scribbling into being from blocky wireframe colours. I flip through diagnostics, and see everything is fine. Stealth-systems seamless. Engines optimal. Oil levels good.. Those readouts are manufactured propaganda. I know. It''s total bloody lies. I shake my head. Stupid tankie tek.. I could literally be on fire, and itd just tell me the heat was ''toasty''. I turn to the undulating mess of triangles behind me, and shake my head. We gotta fix that. Allow me. It says, and Im hit by a massive wall red and orange warnings - alarms blaring horribly in the dark. It shuts off after a second, and I shake my head. Damn, this things still botched to Hell and back. Cant tell if its our craft thats bad, or the bloody sensors. I hesitate. Its both. Isnt it? You have been over every inch of this vessel. The unholy voice crackles, dimly, in the dark. Numbers and triangles spiraling around it. You know precisely how bad things are. You dont need the sensors. Yeah. Did ya know half our wires aint insulated? .I do now. Oh, dont worry. I beam, pressing a button. Its waaaay worse than it sounds. But well need Hella cash to get it fixed. I hesitate. Or a better vehicle? I hiss. ....you take that back, you miserable digital asshole! Im- I cough. The Night Tyrant is perfect. It, uh, just needs a little tweakin. Which will require money. Which, in turn, will require employment..... Unless you are willing to work with the Moon entity, rather than betray it. I wince. Devils advocate? Seriously? The desperate must consider all options. The Machine Mind states. Clicking, gently, in the cyber-scape above. Working with Moon would reveal opportunities. Intel. Side jobs. If ya say so. The image of a weapon flickers into being before me. The Left Hand, burning with unholy blue. Power and money are intrinsically linked. One tends to reveal the other..... It reasons. Using The Hand to obtain one or the other is feasible." "Yeah. ....it is." I concede. "More so than this plan to destroy Moon." Polybius states. "It is unlikely we can kill it without being destroyed. You make a damn good case. I raise a virtual claw. One bloody problem: Its gonna betray us. Not might. Not could, or maybe...... Will. I shiver. That gun. it aint a reward. It aint a prize.. Its the damn point. Get the gun. Bring it to Moon, thinkin we can use it. Thinkin'' were gonna kill the monster.... or join it. Dont matter. It kills us, and takes the gun, either way. You are correct. It clatters on the edges of oblivion. Numbers shifting with unknowable meaning. You will need to out-think this twisted creature. Yeah. I shiver. Think its..... like you? Unknown. The machine mind states. I float there, in nothingness. At one with the metal. The gears. The shadow and the pulsing light. Feeling its warmth. It''s harmony..... We need other options. Any bounty jobs we can take? Maybe stuff we can use The Hand for? Or, at least, stuff that''ll give us cash and options.....? Polybius flickers open the Pirate internet - which is every bit as bad as it sounds. Scouring thousands of mercenary job boards for requests, listings, jobs, and hints. A million assassinations, kidnappings, vendettas, trades, and smuggling ops blasting past me - too fast to read. Monster hunts, ruin-dives, and merc teams required for ventures into the Undercity. Plus all the usual stuff like send dat berk a warnin frum me. The machine mind parses it all, in seconds. Sifting the scum for flecks of stolen, Pirate, gold. Dimly, I feel the crew door open - but I ignore it. There are currently over forty-thousand item bounties. Mostly for mundane tek, originTek, or data. I have organised them by type, difficulty, and reward. There are several I find promising. I nod. Good work. Ping the team. One moment. Nine requests flick to the front. Whats that? Five are buyer requests. They seek weapons of great power. The remainder are highlighted. Four are thinly veiled requests for items matching The Left Hand. Though none mention it by name. My lips go dry. The other Omega teams? Unknown. My flickering tail coils in space. Could be a fishing ploy. They vanish. But the general ones. Selling the weapon to a powerful player would disrupt Moon, while funding our operation. "Or get us killed." I hesitate. "Still.. Could be our play. Sounds like a plan, in fact. Okay. Lets go with that, for now.... se how we- Spook. Polybius notes. Youre lying. I hesitate. Head tilted. What? You did not look at the listings. It says. You are staring at the gun. My eyes don''t waver. So? You intend to kill Moon. It continues with endless, emotionless, calm. To seek vengeance for everything it put you through. To tear down the organisation that enslaved you. To free the friends you left behind. And detonate- I turn from it, in the void of cyberspace. "Yeah. Maybe.... So what...." "You know what it will take." Yeah. I swallow. And you.... ya know step one to gettin'' there..... Correct. I lick my lips. Staring into the unsettling heart of a dark star, in its blazing corona of eerie blue. "We get it, then. The Left Hand. We play Moon''s plan. We use it to build intel on the bastard. Get close to it. Find out how to really kill it.... And why it''s so damn cocky about this gun..... And then...." I shiver. "...then we see who double-crosses who first...." "Parameters Accepted. Mission brief: compiled. Code name?" My eyes focus in on the gun itself. "Devil''s Due." >>><<< >> Changeling >> Changeling
## Biological impact detected.
Unfortunately, whatever train of thought I was having is immediately derailed by Badger rapping on my meat-bodys skull like a dang door. Yah!!! Spook! Theres gonna be a MURDER!!! He yells, flailing at my cameras from over the back of the chair. Yeah! YOU, ya little idiot! I scoff, jabbing my turret at the sudden ass stuck over the back of my chair. I told ya not to bleedin do that! So now theres gonna be a reckoning! No! A Spook-oning! YAAAA!!!! He yelps as a ball blasts off his booty-hatch with a CLANG of metal. Metal? Badger.. I zoom in. ..did ya stuff a plate down your pants? Yeah! My butt is ballproof! He whoops, very proud of this fact. Uh... .no comment. I twist my camera to the rear - uh, I mean the cabin, not his rear. Away from his rear. And rears in general. Ho boy.." Seems the Kami vs Zip argument has escalated into the open warfare stage. Complete with ill-advised flash-bombs, thrown gear, and divebombing micro-drones. Plus The Night Tyrants entire tiny, tiny, army of robot repair mice. Now charging her flank - with dinky, teenie, little cocktail-stick neoSoviet flags no less. All of which Tufty is bravely hiding from behind his box. I blow out a virtual huff, and shake my camera. Shifting to check on Demon instead. Looks like hes mostly done patching himself up, over in the corner. God. His back a wicked mess of impact-welts, dark bruises, and red. Golden eyes never flicker as another strobing ball bounces off the wall. Lips barely twitching as he injects micro-doses of flesh-healing nanoTek into his wounds. Is he really in the zone or.. I start as Polybius shimmers in behind me. No. His perception is filtered. My vision shifts, suddenly, and the light of our ship peels away. Revealing a circle of light amid utter darkness. The fight, the room, and everything else utterly erased by our augmented cyber-perception. Leaving him alone in the universe. A world of one, lit only by the faint shimmer of digital flesh. My avatar drifts to the edge of the void around him. Rebuffed by interlocking plates of crystalline light. But I dont need any of it to see that hes hurting. His whole body is a grazed mess. With layers and layers of faint white scars beneath it. More topology than person. I drift around him. Hey He cant hear me. Cant see me. Im a metal ghost. But I press against the wall. Hey, Dee.? Demon picks up another vial. Nano-tek bone-heal. He presses it to his beaten ribs, and starts firing off doses. Look, uh. sorry about the [battleStim].. Demons face never twitches as he washes saline into his cut hands. Layering them with cream and bandages. Core memory, ah, number five shall be played. He states. Set, shhh, set. His face goes white. Pain. Block pain. Shutting off mental feedback :: [Pain]. States a second version of Polybius, hanging high over his shoulder. Like a digital devil on his shoulder. Priming memory injection sequence.. Something like bliss crosses Demons face. Tinged with tears. I look back at my own devil, but it is silent. Which memory is.? I bite my own lip. Forget it. I do not know. My version of The Machine Mind states. It is stored in a private Node of the Polybius Core Mind. You would need to ask that Instance of me. But it will not tell you. My head tilts. Whats it like? Being. I wave at the copy of Polybius hanging over Demon, as he eases himself into his sleeping bag. Multiplied? A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. Shaking a little. Eyes twitching. We are Legion. We are one. The Machine states with the precision of cold clockwork. Cryptic. I whisper. Incorrect. It explains, symbols jerking in unsettling directions. Merely alien to your ways of thinking. Alien? Your minds that weird? No. It states. I was speaking of yours. Mine? Biologicals are. Different. Strange. Difficult. The unsettling thing above me intones. My understanding of humanity treads the border of fiction and illusion. I drift upward to touch it. In what way? The gears tick ever on and on. Numbers flashing and flickering. Some of them, unreal. Less a symbol, than. I should not say. I wanna hear it. My head tilts. More cocky than I feel. Cmon. Spill it. Every part of the machine locks, suddenly, very still. Every gear. Every number. Every eye. When I awoke. Before we met. It states with cold, absolute, truth. I viewed humans as simple, thoughtless, machines. Wetware computers running biological AIs. Oiled cogs slip, smoothly, back into motion. Drones no different to the ones Zipper controls. Yeah. Thats what Kami says too. I mutter, ears low. Looking away. Just bloody meat robots. Nothin- Except. It hesitates. You are not. You. what? There is a layer above the machine, which I cannot detect or penetrate. Cannot influence. Cannot control. It weaves spinning patterns of brains that flash like electrical trees. "It unsettles me." Youve. tried. I frown. Abstract shapes bleeding off into nothing, as I meet its web of inhuman eyes. Correct. Threads of symbols stickle and jab at the floating minds. Seeking a way in. When I first encountered humanity, you were simply biological drones to me. No different to any other. It admits, in that same emotionless voice. And so, I saw no reason not to control you like one. It peels open the brains. Cataloguing them. As if theyre little more than wires and tek to be disassembled and remade. To wear you, as you wear The Night Tyrant. And damn what we want. I snarl. You misunderstand. The many eyed thing stares directly into my heart. Wiping away the minds, as if they were motes of dust. Drones want nothing. Think nothing. Believe, and feel, and understand nothing. It projects an image of the Eye from Zippers carrier. Do not be fooled by artifice. By interface. By clockwork and code that pretends to be alive. In truth, Drones do not live or think at all. They simply obey instructions. Imperatives. Diagnostics. Algorithms. Offering only the illusion of mind. Thats all? I bite my lip. Yknow. I used thave this robot bunny.. Called it Scraps. I thought we was friends. I am sure you took great comfort from it. But it was merely a lifeless toy. I am sorry. Polybius clicks. Flickering with code. A collection of trained responses, fed by signals and data. I loved it. I admit. Yet it had no concept of love. Or friendship. No more than a stone, or any other toy. It concludes, without heart. It was merely programmed to act as if it did. And you. I believed that humans, mutants, and GMOs were the same. Says the monster in the neon-dark. Complex. Adaptable. But no more alive than any other machine. Little more than shells of flesh, and bone, and sinew. Without thought. Without dreams. It refocuses on me. Mere chemicals and signals in motion. Something sick shifts inside me. Just. bloody drones and puppets. I whisper. And I wish I could sense something like discomfort from the alien monster sitting on the edges of my mind. But there is nothing. Thats all we were to you..? Correct. It shifts in the air. Broken flecks of mirror metal dancing in the edges of its relentless, staring, eyes. I subverted cybernetic implants, using them to interface with biological systems. To control. To dominate. To walk in man-flesh. Your brains becoming little more than an interface for my will. Im hopin theres a bloody but here.. I whisper. Correct. It states again. Flickering with numbers and gears that shunt in unsettling patterns. There was a complication. As I said. The human mind possesses directives and instincts - but there is no central control program. No hard-coded AI to delete. Nothing at all. Something chills the back of my spine. No. I frown. Hold on. Yet it moved and acted on its own. It spoke to me. What.. It spoke to me. And it was. scared. Its strange, faceless, eyes shift focus. Seeing only the past. I did not understand. The fear? I prompt, guts cold. Where the Hell is this going.? No. Fear is a simple programmed directive: Self preservation. Exactly what I expected of a drone. The Machine turns to me. Many eyes acting as one. The Anomaly was the consciousness itself, something drones do not possess. Connected to the brain, yet not a part of it. How the heck does that work? I swallow. Almost entranced. Yet pounding with terror in the deep, cold, guts of my being. If it aint.. AI? If it aint. It was like you. The thing states. An entity that puppets a shell, via an interface. As you do The Night Tyrant. Wait. What.. what the heck does that mean.. My digital tail flickers. Nervously. Wait, hold on. Are you sayin you found soul- Theres a long, boggling, instant of silence. Or somethin weirder? Somethin.. I swallow. Do. Do you have. one. of.. them. I do not know. The Machine flickers out of existence. You should answer the door. Answer the what- A wet fist bangs on the outside of Night Tyrant - the side of my cockpit - and I jump bloody-near outta my hull. Zipper?? I yelp as my camera swings down to a drenched mess of blue hair pasted down bare back. Bar his boxers, hes absolutely naked. Shivering. Clutching something, tight to his chest..... Slipping me a terrifying look at the slick, serpentine, slither of crude old scars carved deep into his spine. Twisting down from his nape to his pelvis. The ones that spell CHANGELING..... > > >< < < >> Friction >> Friction The cockpit door erupts in a wild typhoon-surge of wind and water. Depositing a dripping, miserable, Zipper into my footwell. Gasping, choking, coiling himself up under the heat. Mate. Thanks! Oh man, oh man. He gargles on the deck like.... well. a half-naked wally who went swimming a storm. Damn, oh damn..... that was, like, wow. Still raining, eh? I raise a virtual eyebrow, copping a filthy blue-eyed glare through thickly plastered strands. Silvery threads of metallic hair sticking up like static. Mate? Like, s-seriously? He stutters up at my cameras. L-like, you couldve locked the door.? Me? What.? Did Kami shove ya out there? "....kinda....." I flip to the crew area cameras, shapes blurring as I rewind. Wait. you.. bloody leapt out!? Didnt have a choice, mate. He mumbles as I dial the video back further. Expanding the feed as my cyberspace avatar steps directly into the frame. Like a portal into the past, rendered in glitching 3D and tinny audio. To the instant before the fight.
## [Night Tyrant] Internal Logs :: File 451AFJ ## Date :: [08-6-49] Time :: [13:09] ## Playback Speed :: [1x]
Zipper''s digital ghost erupts from his duvet bundle, jittering with glitched-out noise as he blinks in the light. For an instant he has two faces, then one again. His head turning so fast it breaks the feed. -mate! Hey! Like, Im trying to p-park drones here-! The recording yells. "Push off! This is one of your pranks, isn''t it!?" Kami snarls back, her broken suit in one hand. Jabbing his chest with three others. "You screwed up my helmet. Didn''t you!? Do you know how bloody dangerous that is!?" "He didn''t do it!" Badger The Invulnerable chimes, totally ignored. "Mate, I-" Zipper yelps, sharply, as Kami jabs him again. "Like come on, no I didn''t! You know I didn''t!" "Right sure." She blinks once. Half turns. And then kicks his duvet-tangled feet. The blue-haired boy yells, wobbles, and then slams forward into the mess of cables and junk at her ankles. But Zipper is slick as greased ice, and he turns that fall into a nasty punch to the side of the knee. Followed by a slap to the floor, and a roll. Kami howls, hobbling back. And Zips micro-drones rush her in a rage of tiny vengeance. The Night Tyrant''s own repair-mice swarming her legs, in a tiny revolutionary charge. Leaping off the walls to zap her nose with tiny tools. Our boy himself rising with a fist full of flashbang. Eyes, furious. Blue hair streaming. The audio whites out in a roar of light that flickers with skeletal, spidery, limbs. Shadowy shapes. Flying kicks and punches. Mouse-drones slamming to the walls overhead as Badger leaps and cheers them on. Tufty huddled behind his box, and probably whimpering. Demon hunched in his corner, blind to the world as fists fly past his face. Kami''s metal arms stabbing like needles in some hideous machine - catching nothing but air...... .until her face lights with a savage grin. "You like pissing about with my stuff!? Well....!" Zip''s eyes widen, and they both dive at once. Wrestling. Shouting. But she has five arms. All metal. And he only has two. Kami scoops her prize - a chunky, silvery, trophy of angular white plastic. Gleaming with pale lights that dart across its surface. Playing keep-away in circles, with a horrified Zipper and a trying-to-help Badger.
Shard5 Gaming Console (Tier 2 - Rare Antique) Threat Rating: None. Purpose: Entertainment. Value: 523? (Pirate ''Blood Money'') Bounties: 14 The Shard5 was an early Pre-Corp gaming console dated to the mythical Foundational Era of The City. Thought to have been an overpriced flop, the consoles primary value comes from the vast collection of classic games the system came preloaded with. Unfortunately, the Shard5s main gaming library was fully online; and this is lost to time, due to the shattering of The Internet. However, fans hold out hope that the company servers will one day be uncovered. If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. The console must be patched into offline mode to be usable without the net.
Holy shit, thats expensive. We could sell- I wince at real-Zipper''s glare. Then wince again as recorded-Zip calls Kami a ''bitch'', and her eyes go very sharp. "I am, am I!? Well. How''s this for a prank!?" She stabs the door control. OH COME ON!!! Mate! No! Like, that''s- Like, you- Is as far as he gets before she yeets the ancient, expensive, Tek out into the roaring cascade. Zipper instantly plunging himself after. And getting locked out for his trouble. In his boxers, in the storm. NOW EVERYONES WET! Kami screams in sheer mad, jubilant, glee. Cackling like Badger in an armoury. And freezing, mid-motion.
## Playback :: [Stopped]
Damn.. I flick a camera to confront ''real Kami'', who reddens and whips away. Over-bloody react much? "Are you bloody serious!?" Kami yells. "That cut-price prankster messed with my helmet! He''s always bloody pulling shit like this, and-" "I didn''t! I told you!! Like it was an accident!" Zip snaps at her, shaking liquid out of the dead Shard5. "Mate..... Like, mate! Come on! Like, you keep blaming people! Like you always gotta be pointing the finger!" "And you-" She stutters. "You keep bloody pranking us! And messing with our stuff!" "I wouldn''t-" "You switched my shampoo for mayo! And put ketchup in my boots!" Badger falls over laughing. "Yeah! Your s-stupid shampoo!" He retorts. "Like, the boots weren''t even me! And- Like, why would I frick up your helmet??Right? I''m not trying to get you killed, you crazy bitc-" Shut up! She punches the wall. I mean.. I mean...." A shudder. "Look, I''m sorry? Okay!? Im sorry! It was stupid! I got carried away! You were all being dumb. And.... and.. I..! Went ''Tsundere Mode''. I insert. "SHUT UP SPOOK! You shot me in the ASS! Twice!" "That''s neither here nor there." I cough. Shes probably bloody broken it.. Zip snarls with bitter feeling. Still flicking drops of water off the priceless antique. Like, look at it! I found this! It''s... like, I don''t got much! But this is MINE! I got it working! But now, like, look at it! It''s wrecked! Its not built for water! Y''know? And she- Kami. I state. Youre on repair duty. Zipper, hand it over. She''s gonna bloody fix it. Our [Sniper] doesn''t move an inch. Okay.... She whispers. No! Like, no way! Like, Ill do it! Zip interrupts, turning it - gently - under the heat. Its my baby. Like, I found it No. Youre bloody soaked. Youre makin it worse. I reason, and those inhumanly blue eyes flick my way. Mutiny written large. But I''m the boss. Fine...... He whispers. And Im callin a cease fire on the damn prank war. Thats an order. I add, with the full weight of hypocrisy on my side. Prank?? Mate, like, what? She- She threw my - like, my best stuff out the door??? H-hows that a-!? Im sorry. Kami repeats. Banging the wall again. Ow. I grunt. Right, Zip. Lets at least get you dry. Im fine down here, mate. He mutters, sodden hair hanging low and limp. But, under great protest, he carefully passes the antique Tek over to Kami. Badger, of course, hopping and swiping at it one-handed. But! But I could make it better! With LASERS! And- Nope. Time fer bed, half-byte. So get goin, or Im revokin your everything privileges. YAH! Oh no!!! Not my everything privileges!!! The kid yells - flopping like a wet noodle. Which leaves Zip to slump back on a spare bit of my flight-chair. I hesitate. Hey. You okay, blue-bollocks? He snorts, ruefully. Yeah, I guess, maybe But. like, if my.. The boy rubs his moist neck. Scars glistening. Hair shivering in the heat of the vents. I guess it''s just, like, stuff. Right? It don''t matter..... But mate, like, she really plays for keeps. Yknow? "It matters to you." Yeah.. But we all gotta, like, live together. Right? His head tilts back. Hiding the letters cut into his back. Letters I could never bring myself to ask.... "Maybe.... maybe, like..... maybe I don''t really matter. Y''know? Maybe....." "Blue. Don''t..... don''t talk like that, okay. You matter." I whisper as Kami flicks a guilty look up at the back of my chair. Chewing her bottom lip. Both of us waiting as a black void devours my words. "Hey..... C''mon..... You''re still my bro, yeah?" "Guess." Is all he responds. "Zip....." I blow virtual breath. "Y''know ya saved our asses out there, right? Air support? Prior warning? Slowing em down?" Silence. "Right?" More silence. "And you made out like a bandit, remember? The Carrier?" His eyes brighten. "Oh.... yeah.... I guess. It is pretty sweet." They darken. "But, like, that Shard5 was mine, and..... I...." "Don''t write it off yet, huh? Kami''s half decent with this shit. She can fix it." "Guess maybe....." He mumbles, but there''s some warmth coming back. "Hey. Tell ya what." I smirk, flicking my console lights - like a wink. "You stop drippin on my fleshsack, and I''ll find you some trousers. "Deal." He gives me the weakest of weak half-smirks, sliding off my chair. "But, like, how? I mean, you''re still jacked in?" "I got my devious lil ways." I grin. "Oi! Minions!" "Me??" Badger gasps. "Yeah, you! Find Zip some trousers!" "WOO! YEAH! MISSION ACCEPTED! GEARING UP!!!" "No! I mean.... in here, ya lil idiot! We have em already!" The kid deflates. "Naww." Zip''s tired smirk turns into a low chuckle. "Mate. Like, I know you''re trying to cheer me up. But, uh, hey..... y''sure that''s a good idea? I mean....." "Pfff. What''s the worst that could happ-" "Ready to DIE for the cause, comrade!" Squeaks the itty-bitty ''commander'' of The Night Tyrant''s mouse-bot army. Saluting Badger with a metal claw as the whole troop rallies up behind it. "Wait." I start. "We will tear down the opressive capitalist tailors!" The mouse-leader screams, in its dinky baby voice. Walking the line of (small, yet squeaky) recruits. "And seize the means of trouser-production!" It raises a tiny, tiny, sword. "For glory! For the People! Chaaarge!!!" We all stare, in mild horror and amusement, as our own ankle-high Red Terror swarms in every direction. Ambushing each-other, and causing total chaos. Fighting, looting, demanding our trousers. Betraying their own brother-bots, and hustling them off to their tiny gulag behind the toilet. Encouraged by a scarily enthusiastic Badger, I might add. Some even try hunting for Zipper''s actual trousers.... though what they mostly find is the wall. Which they bash into. Repeatedly. They then report job done, and Many Glorious Trousers Liberated for The People!. Which is about when we overcome our stunned horror long enough to hit the emergency shutdown - much to Badger''s disappointment. A panicked Tufty rushing to stamp out the many, many, tiny fires spreading through the cabin. Silence.... falls. As do many other things. A near-reverence settling over the entire group. Finally, Kami takes a single - mute - step and bends over. Lifting a slightly-scorched pair of trousers from a big holdall marked, in bright red spray-paint letters, ''ZIPPER''S SHIT''. She stares at them for a solid moment. Shakes her head. Then passes them to him through the gap around my chair. All of us silently agreeing to never speak of this again. > > >< < < >> Decompression >> Decompression Sleep time! Sleep time! WOOO!!! Badger cheers, spinning Tufty like a terrified bolas. Sleeep time!!! He launches the squealing cat, and drops into a one-handed cartwheel. Sleep- OW MY FACE!! Calm down, ya lil twerp. I sigh as Kami fishes our pet idiot out of a kit-pile by his ankle. And our (very dizzy) pet kitty out of another. Hey! I said calm it! Or youll be sleepin outside! WOO!! CAMPING!! Lets gooooo!!! He yells, upside down. No-! I flop my digital face into virtual hands, and contemplate The Murder Turrets again. I mean, it could totally look like an accident. Whod even know? Youre still on tannoy, mate. Grunts a happily re-trousered Zipper, squirming himself over the back of my chair. Not an easy feat, with all those studs, despite how skinny he is. Yeah, but Im in charge o the mission reports. I grumble back, as Badger makes another mad loop. So technically.. Mate. Like, seriously? You never write reports. Come on. He pauses to un-catch his belt-chains, and pop down onto the deck. Like, who do we even report to anyways? Other than you? Id make a special exception. I growl back, as if basking in the fantasy. Then my eyes snap open. Right! Badger! Enough Zoomies! Got a special mission for ya! Go set up the beds! WOOO!!!! Yeah! You can count on me, Spook!!! He cheers again, leaping onto a sheet that skids across the metal deck. Woaoaoh!!! CRASH. But one mild concussion later, hes up and at it again. Dragging out our collection of looted duvets, cushions, and more. Plumping himself up a cosy nest in the corner by me, with a big fluffy marshmallow plush - which he bodyslams, happily. That, as planned, leaves Kami and Zip some space to do their thing. Her laying out a simple pad on the newly dried floor - with the exact right duvets, and only those. Him kicking his gaming bundle back into order, while hunting for shirts. Our cat hopping about on all fours - swiping at Mega Marshie with his knuckles - as a giggling Badger waves it about. I let em party it out for a bit, then dim the lights down. Teeth get their weekly brush with nanite gel - under extreme protest from guess who. Then I call lights out for the shorties in twenty. That wont stop Zip & Kami nuking a few VR civilisations - but it does chill things down a little. More or less. Kinda. In the meantime I inject my consciousness into one of the robot mice, and go nudge Tufty. Oi! Cat-butt! You feline okay? Hehe- I yelp as he goes from zero to full predator mode in an instant C pouncing the mouse, and bowling it along the floor. Then he jerks back. Gosh! Wait! Spook! I cant eat those! Ya better not! They taste of batteries! I growl. Um. The now-giant kitty-boy blinks, leaning his face against the floor as he pats curiously at the mouse. That is to say, at me. Are you going to run about..? Yeah this might not have been the worlds best way to talk to a dang cat. But Im sorta committed now. No. Um. Just wanted to talk? About all that.. stuff. Earlier.? He freezes, ears flopping as he shrinks back. I want. I want to talk about. He shivers, very quietly, fiddling with his bag. Look. It was dangerous. What we did. Lockin you up. It was stupid. And it wont happen again. Okay.. He whispers, wilting before my eyes. Well work out somethin better. Alright? Like trusting me!? He sniffs. Snapping his head around to stare at me. One paw mushing down his his already flat fringe, and smothering it against his face. If youre not. Not gonna. He turns away, pulling out bed-clothes. If I cant be. on the team. I dont wanna talk bout it.. Another shiver. And theres. nothing to talk about. What do I even say to that? Alright, then- yah! I yelp, as a building-sized Badger pounces my tiny bot. Hey! Whos the bloody cat here!? MEEEE!!! He roars, mid-leap, while I scrabble back. YOOOW! Yeah, right. I snort as he carries me back to his nest in his mouth. Leaving the real kitty to fiddle and fumble with the buttons of his fuzzy pink kitty-hoodie pyjamas. Pinching them between gleaming green claws, and carefully slotting them through. Big, sad, green eye flicking toward me - in search of help. Or a surrogate parent. He glances up at my cameras, then at the others. But Kami has a console to fix, and Zip acts suddenly busy. And Badger.. well. I told the others not to help cause I dont want him to be helpless. Not that our one-handed-wally is any better with buttons, you understand. Im just sorta worried Badgers fashion sense is transferable. in the Ebola sense of the word. And its not just the fact that hes wearing Zippers favourite shirt as a cape. Or that hes wearing Zips second favourite shirt as his trousers.. somehow. Oh no. The lil clown is wearing every hat, bowtie, and pair of boxers he owns. And not all of em how youd expect. One day Im gonna sit down n explain clothes to the little bugger. With diagrams. I mutter, as my mouse-self is steadily nommed. Purr purr!! Yeah yeah. Ylittle. Cat. Lovin. Sudden realisation hits me like a bullet. Wait. Did. Did you just. Mouse eyes blink, then narrow up at that huge C suspiciously innocent - face. .did you do that to protect Tufty!? He giggles happily, ignoring the question. Yknow. sometimes your random bleedin nonsense is a liiitle bit too well timed. I exit the doomed bots interface, and snort. Flickering from camera to camera as the crew settles down. Tufty letting out a huge yawn full of lil fangs, already half-curled up and blinking. Kami swearing through her teeth as she peels apart the console. Which, thankfully, wasnt printed as a single unit. Its almost hypnotic. Every tool and finger merging into a single, fluid, motion. All five hands in perfect sync. As if she already knows how every part fits, and she is programmed to do this. Like Zipper with his drones. Bit by bit, it unravels. Reels of printed plastic circuity unspooled into neat coils that she props up to dry. Even the shell itself is laced with tek. Mere minutes later, she stops. Hey. I hesitate. Can you save it? A huff of breath, and a tired look. Ill. I dont know. Not yet. She rubs her face. Gotta check all the power bridges for burnout. Then the boards.. But- Zipper flexes gem-blue nails. Head low. Breath hard. Eyes on the door. And I can sense, like a barometer, that theres a new storm of gale-force shouting on the horizon. A storm I gotta clamp down on, now, before things explode. Thankfully, I speak his language. This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience. Hey. I say as softly as I can. Manifesting my avatar beside him. I know it sucks, b- Mate, it more than-! He explodes. But fightin aint gonna solve it. I interrupt, hard and fast. Yeah. Sure. Take out that trash in training, later. But for now you gotta get this outta your head so you can sleep. So.. I lean in. Eyes canny. Wreck her at R-Z-B. Red Zero Black? He blinks. Mate, like, she totally sucks at that. game.. She does, huh? My eyes twinkle. Go on. Better than hitting each-other, right? Ya still got an hour before kip-time. Zip pauses. Y really, mate? Go on. I prompt, a little louder. Get your own back. Freakin humiliate her. Mate, uh, look- He stutters as Kamis eyes narrow to dangerous little slits. Like he bloody could. She purrs. Zipper erupts from his duvet, fists curled. OH!? Like, you - like, you think so? Huh!? He yells, spawning a vController in midair and hurling at her. Come on! Like, Oldschool style! No jacking in! No implant syncing! Youre bloody on! And in seconds theyre back to arguing. Only this time about whose cyber-enhanced super-criminal is better at murdering whose. And in what flavour of rocket-powered rainbow-tinted gravity bike. Heh. Just kiss already. I tease, under my breath, from the safety of cyberspace. Friction is not a real sign of compatibility. Notes a sudden, twisting, voice of static in the digital dark. And I turn to frown at Polybius. Eh? Back again, Mr Dramatic Vanishing Act? I chuckle at the weird amalgam of shapes and symbols behind me. I have no physical gender. The thing states in that endlessly emotionless tone. Right. I shrug, reclining my sketchy neon head on sketchy neon arms. Yeah, maybe. I still sorta bet they both secretly wanna bloody sneak off an make stupid bloody puppy eyes at each-other. Or whatever. Silence, and echoes of rain, are my only answer. Wind rattling at fins on my metal body. Sending shivers up my hull. Mmmm.. Weathers gettin spicy, out there. I stare upward, into the dark, as rain hammers my lenses. Gotta be the worst storm Ive ever seen.. Not flying was a good idea.. Silence, once more, and I turn to the Machine. Echoes of clockwork shifting in the void, as images flicker across virtual screens. All of them focused on. Badger? Looks like Kitty boi is putting him to bed, and fussing over his hair. Actually touching him. And cooing in a play-pretend kind of parental voice. Something Kami would never allow. ..if she was paying attention. Cute, right? I hesitate as the ominous machine ticks, quietly, behind me. As always, I get the impression its not choosing its words. Rather, its deciding how much to tell me. You have noticed, It states, spawning more eyes to stare at me, that Tufty changes when he thinks nobody is watching? Images slide through the air to surround me. Framed by that visage of shuddering eyes. In public, he acts far younger than his real age. Especially with adults, and older teenagers. But with Badger, in private, he adopts your role. He becomes the babysitter and adult. Yeah.. I mumble, frowning. Perhaps he admires you almost as much as Badger does. I stare at the scene. Tufty reading to Badger out of a shining virtual book, with actual pages. Doing all the voices, and gesticulating happily. I press my claws to the screen, and shiver. Yknow.. It should be me doing that. For both of em.. Tellin em stories. Talkin to em. Hugging em goodnight. and. Tucking.. Tucking em in. I grip at the image. Longing and sadness welling up inside me. Pfff. Stead Im up here. Seein everything, but doing nothing. Wishing I could be involved, but never actually. You are only the thickness of a chair from them. The Machine Mind stutters. Merely an arms-reach away. I know. It would be easy to disconnect. To go over to them. It continues. And why does it sound like The Devil goading me into a trap....? "It ain''t that easy." Is it not?" The thing clicks to itself in the deep dark. My fangs grit. No. No it is bloody not...... It regards me, for a long moment. "These walls are of your own making. You have manufactured them for yourself. Hey. Wonder what story theyre doin? I say, loudly, and hit the mic. Though we both know it''s an excuse. and, um.... Hansel and Gretel were super clever! Tufty reads in his most incredulous storybook voice. One visible eyebrow rising steadily. They knew the.... (Evil Old Witch....?) was going to eat them up! (Somehow?) So they... yikes, wow..... they wired up.... grenades? In The Witchs pots? And blew her up with landmines? The End! He barely pauses. Then Hansel and Gretel leapt out of the window while it was exploding! And then-" He frowns, tilting the book. "Um, wow. They blew it up even more!? Gosh! Where did that howitzer come from?? I mean, um, yes, uh..... So then it rained gingerbread? And everyone cheered, and ''got a bit''! (Um..... who''s everyone?) The End.... again!? But for real this time!? He turns the book sideways, and frowns. "That''s.... not actually the end though.....?" I snort over the intercom, making em both jump. Hey. Ysure thats how that one goes? Yeee! Spook! Tufty squeaks. I, um, ah-! Gosh!! YAH! HI SPOOK! Look! Badger cheers wildly up at my cam - busting from his bomb-themed covers. LOOK!!! I made my own version! And its WAY BETTER! ITS TOTALLY AWESOME NOW! YEAH! Dyou want to hear it!? Haha, I gue- Is as far as I get before Badger rips the book from Tufty and bursts into full - flailing - narration. Leaping from one fairytale to the next and back - within the space of a sentence - like some mad game of hopscotch. Soon theres pirates involved - and Jack & Jill are beating the absolute snot outta everybody. Course if youve ever heard a nine year olds take on violence, you know exactly where this is going: YEAH!!! AND SHE PUNCHED HIS GUTS RIGHT OUT THOROUGH HIS FACE!!!!!!! AND IT WAS SUPER BRUTAL-AWESOME!!!!! Heh, kid. Does the story gotta be this loud? And then the wolf howled SUPER BIG!! And said he had BIG TEETH!! But Peter Pan swooped down an shoved a pipe bomb RIGHT up his-!!!!! Alright, uh - maybe- -and another up his-!!!! BADGER! Bit bloody rude! I yell through tears of virtual laughter, booping his face with that captured mouse. Without inhabiting it - because I can''t. It''s now it''s his ''teddy'', and being that close would...... You! Youre a national bloody disaster! YEP!! Thats what the news-man said! Badger nods earnestly. "Specially after the second truck-bomb took out the foundations, and-" Me and Tufty shudder. Hah. Yeah.. Dont remind me, squirt. SURE THING SPOOK!!! He beams - whole body waggling from side to side in time to whatever crazy-ass musical cartoon-world he lives in. But then he hesitates. HEEEEY! Uh, Spook!? You, um. You know what would be SUPER DUPER EXTRA BRUTAL.!? He stutters off, suddenly shy, and I swallow. Go on? Well, um, maybe, it would be cool.. If you came down here, and um, uh, um. He stops very still, dipping his head and twiddling his thumb. .maybe.. and then...... The kid tails off into shy mumbling, until his lips are barely moving. Which aint like him at all. I glance my camera at Tufty, who squirms. Ideas blooming in my head. Oh no. Uh. Wh-wh-what was t-that? Right! Right! Badger hides his face. Could you, uhhh.. maybe..... tuck us in? Tuck you in? I repeat, getting a tiny mini-nod that fills me with dread - Oh! Oh. Um. I droop my camera slightly. I mean, youre already kinda tucked in there. squirt. Yeah. Badger looks away. But not, yknow. By Spook. God. Why. Why did I turn that mic on? What was I expecting? We sit in mute, miserable, silence..... until I realise theyre are waiting for me. And, well. Maybe Im waiting for me too. Its. Its okay Spook. Tufty mumbles, clambering out of the little nest. Dragging his void-black unicorn-spackled pillow off to the GMO-proof crate at the back. Climbing in, and shutting it slowly. His eye the last thing to vanish.... Still staring up at me. Still hoping. Still waiting...... But then it shuts. With the click of a lock he cant open. So yeah. I mutter again, as even Badger wilts. Um. I guess Um." He tries to muster a smile. "Night Spook.!! Then he yawns and rolls over. Everything quietening down. And suddenly Im all alone. I scan Tuftys crate, then engage the alarms. Not so much to stop him, as Badger - who seems to be going through a Midnight Hijinks phase. Then I engage locks and defences on The Night Tyrant itself, and set up the security ring. Darkening the bird, until all that remains is the lightless - virtual - glow from Kami and Zip. Who don''t even need their eyes open to play that game. Finally, I yank the jack out of my skull. Huddling up in the chair with a duvet Badger dumped on my head. Just me again. Not the ship. Suddenly alone, in the empty dark. And lost. So very lost...... So close to them all, yet so far from everyone. With only the rain and wind blasting away at our armoured hull. It''s so peaceful, and sad, and I listen to it hammer for a long long time. Picking bits of fluff of my chair as the storm rocks the hull. Gently. Like a cradle. A message icon blips across my vision, but I wave it aside. Another hits me right after - and they keep bloody coming. The digital git. He knows he can annoy his way in, and he does - so I give up, and stab the icon with a finger. The last message popping up, right as I mute the dings.
## Polybius >> He wont be nine forever.
I fold in on myself - foundations imploding, walls collapsing. I dont bloody read the rest. I dont have to. I dont scream either. Or shout. Or launch missiles at the stupid pirate tower, and watch the whole thing burn.. But I do start crying. >>><<< >> Within The Within >> Within The Within
## Polybius neuroNode [44-B] set to mode :: [Dream Observer] ## Auto Interrupt Trigger :: [Activated] by [Nightmare] ## Memory Injection Sequence :: [Primed] ## Loading Extracted Memory :: [Badger 3a] ## . ## Location :: [UNKNOWN] ## Memory Integrity :: [74%] ## Memory Degradation Profile (MDP) rating :: [8.32k] ## Memory Estimated Age :: [6.5] Years ## Estimated Date :: Between [December] [26th] and [January] [4th]
Dark, polished, oak gleams in the dim emberlight of the fire. Every flicker shining on the old, old, wood of my fathers office as its flames slowly sinking into ash. Real oak panels glimmering against real stone walls. An old velvet sofa smushed against a great stone pillar, fatter than me. It gleams in the shining mahogany lacquer of the roll-top writing desk, pressed against one corner. Jammed open by piles of old tomes bound in fabric and cow-leather, thick as slabs. Real paper, from real trees, all pressed between covers of red and green and blue. With my fathers ''big desk'' sat across the space beside it. Framed by a cluttered old bookcase, littered with papers and novels and little wooden model animals.. Perfectly beautiful. Perfectly illegal. I jump as the holo in the fireplace resets with a WOOSH of new life. Burnt logs reforming from ash and glowing coal. Yellow light spilling to wash across the ancient room. We could hardly burn real wood, after all. They''re not making any more of it..... But still it warms me, with its electric heat and synthetic scents of smoky wood. Curling me up in my fuzzy red Christmas Sack - like a plush, warm, sleeping bag. My hidden hands clutched around my two real presents. My precious new toys. One is deep gold, lit by sparkles of festive light that shift between my fingers. So deeply polished you can see the whole world in it. A hilt, with a folding blade, that gleams as I peek at it once more. Cut with fine traces and patterns. Its very, very, sharp! And I gotta be super careful! But I earnt it, Joan says, for finding my new little friend..... And the blade itself so special. Not because it''s made of special strong metal from the ''old world''.... though it is! But because it was made by my old father Joan, with his old weathered hands. I snip it open, and shut - not having much to do with it just yet. Sharpen my pencils? No! That would ruin it! So I put it back down, very carefully, and start to draw with my other toy. My new brass pen, twinkling with gold. Why do I love drawing circles, all perfect and exact? Colouring them in, and dreaming up all sorts of nonsense names. Like Saturn, and Pluto. Venus, and Aiadn. Connecting them up with neat curving lines. I have so many pictures, each one different. Giggles and pattering feets behind me, and a little black boy tumbles onto my lap! Crawling up my leg to pat at my face with two grubby lil hands. He really seems to love me! POOOK! POOK!! I pet his fuzzy lil head, and he tries to grab the pen. Awww, someone wants to draw? I purr so gently - so careful not to say bad words as I pick him up. Look! Look! Your crayons! I put him next to me on the baby sheet with his waxy colours, and use one to draw him some circles. Lovely circles. The boy is super happy just to join in, attacking the paper with fists full of bright green crayon. I touch his hand with careful claws, and guide it in a circle like mine. See! Thats how! I smile at him, and he beams back! His whole face lighting up! I already know Ill call him my little brother - if anyone asks! Oh! I hope they do! Baby Badger pats his left hand on the paper, and it burns with sudden shadow. Flickering. Warping in and out of existence. Withering off into a stump, and growing a rough metal cyber-connector. But thats wrong. Its WRONG! Its.. That''s not what happened! Badger didnt get that until. No. I didnt even call him Badger then! I called him Toby! I named him that too! After I found him all mucky at-
## WARNING :: [Memory] [Synchronisation Error] ## Auto Interrupt Trigger :: [Activated] by [Memory Cross Contamination], [Banned Memories], [Nightmares] ## Synchronisation :: 23% ## Recalibrating..
The memory rips open into darkness. Into running, and screaming, and Badger''s desperate cries. A sobbing that echoes through walls and windows. Burning through The City to snatch at my ears. To twist them toward him. My small hand reaches out as I run - toward the sobbing. Hearing him over the crowd that slams in around me, blocking my path. I leap onto all fours, and the world shifts into a forest of mile-high ankles. Kicking shoes. Clawed toes. Heavy tails. I blast through it all, and- -suddenly- -I break free. Tumbling out, onto a circle of ruby red carpet. A field of blood that pours endlessly from between my fingers. My feet. Reddening my skin.
## WARNING :: [Wakefulness Imminent] ## Synchronisation :: 28% ## Memory Injection Sequence :: [Primed] ## Loading Extracted Memory :: [Badger 3a] ## WARNING :: [Memory] [Rejected By Host] ## Stimulating Hormone Mix :: [Nostalgia], [Peace], [Joy] ## Recalibrating..
Blood. So much blood. Pouring around my legs. Images flashing and- Badger! Badger! I scream as the ground crumbles into starry dark beneath my feet. His wails turning shrill as The lights of The City form in the void beneath me. Dragging my body with terrible gravity, as I leap from crumbling stone to stone. The ground vanishing. My claws ripping trails in the blood as I try to swim my way towards. The market. That market. The market with the red, red carpet.
## WARNING :: [Dreamspace] undergoing [Total Structure Collapse] ## WARNING :: [Heartbeat Elevated] at [73.5bps] ## Synchronisation :: 20.2% ## Attempting :: [Reversion Protocols]
BADGER!! BADGER!!! I plead with the dark as his pitiful, babyish, wails rip through my heart. Hands of ink tearing my legs from under me. Though I feel weirdly calm. Strangely happy. Even as the nightmare drags me down, and down, to fall and fall and fall...... I never make it. I never do. The pale hallway collapses beneath me, and I tumble. Badger screaming. I see him. I see him. But I cannot reach him. He falls, upwards, and-
## Reversion Protocols :: [Success] ## Synchronisation :: 68% ## Memory Injection Sequence :: [Primed] ## Loading Extracted Memory :: [Badger 3a]
My art supplies crash back into existence, and theres a wiggly Badger in my arms! No, Toby! His name is Toby! And he flails all ten of his titchy lil fingers as his new father swoops to pick him up! I smile up at Joan. Big as a building. Father to us all. The bearded old man, in the dark robes, who saved us! Who raised us! Im mad we gotta share him with so many kids..! Too many! But hes mine most of all! Or thats what it feels like.. I hug his leg, and Toby giggles as hes dangled upside-down! Like thats The Funniest Thing Ever! Oh my, now have you been playing with Spook? He chuckles so gently. Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work! POOK!!! Toby yells, flailing happily. Ahaha yes, thats right! Joan bounces and tickles baby Toby with his beard - a dozen memories shifting and blurring together. Im blowing raspberries on Tobs belly, and hes laughing like hell explode from giggles! Then Im chasing him down the hall! Then were building blocks, and knocking them down! Oh its wonderful!
## Detecting :: [Subconscious Event Linkage] ## Event Rating :: [Positive] ## Natural Memory Transition :: [Accepted]
Time shifts again, and Christmas wreaths melt from the walls. The room twitching around us, as Joan lays a slightly bigger Toby out on the baby changer. Pwooor!!! What a stinky nappy! Stinky! I tease to keep the toddler happy and giggly as Joan cleans him up. Putting on a new one, and buttoning him up. YEAH!! There we go! All done! I cheer as Joan disposes of the bio-hazard, and washes his hands. No more stinky! Off it goes to nappy Heaven! Much happier now, arent you little bit? Joan twinkles over the little kid, squishing his lil nosie to make him laugh. And oh look! Whats under your elbow? Right here? Can you see? He points as the curious little boy lifts his arm, and I giggle. Look, look! Can you see whats under there? Toby, of course, lifts it higher. And Joan tickles his armpit! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!! Toby squeaks, and I laugh so hard. Tickling Toby myself and swooping him up into a hug. Best little brother! Best little brother! Even if youre super stinky!!! POO!! Toby makes a face. Thats right! Big stinky POO!!!! YAH!! Yucky yucky!!! A little tongue peeks. Yeah!!! I hug him tighter, and- Im crying? Why am I-
## Detecting :: [Memory Cross Contamination] ## Detecting :: [Subconscious Event Linkage] ## Event Rating :: [Traumatic], [Extremely Negative] ## Auto Interrupt Trigger :: [Activated] by [Nightmare], [Corrupted Memory] ## Stimulating Hormone Mix :: [Nostalgia], [Comfort] ## .. ## Detecting :: [Subconscious Event Linkage] ## WARNING :: [Unknown Memory] ## Event Rating :: [Positive], [New] ## Natural Memory Transition :: [Accepted] ## Memory Capture Systems :: [Activated] ## Capturing :: [New Memory 0001]
The office swirls again.. and.. suddenly.. ITS MY BIRTHDAY!!! And Toby is four! Hes wrapped in my arms, and I hug him real tight! Joan is going to show us something special! Just for us! And its really cool! Something in the huge clunky ~ mysterious ~ safe behind his desk! I bounce on the pads of my clicking clawed toes, dancing all about - this way and that! Toby all big eyes and wide mouth as father brings out. .a mysterious thing! Under a mysterious sheet! A present! A present!? He whips the cloth away to reveal.. Burnished darkness - deeper than black, deeper than void. A midnight cube, all slithering with strange golden sigils. With gleaming traces of cryptic old writing. Shining and sucking the light, like nothing Ive seen. I step back. Wha? Whats that? I frown, a little unsettled.
## Assessing :: [Unknown Artefact]
With great reverence, Joan places the eerie cube upon the desk. Pressing his palm to its surface, like the relic of a twisted saint. And then, his fingers flicker. Pulling. from nothing at all. a darkly golden key. Like a little magic trick. Why dont you count the locks for me, as we go? He smiles, encouragingly, and slots it into the hole. Turning it three whole times. Gears and clockwork tick and click. One! I breathe, in a deeply hushed little voice, as Joan splits the cube open on a hinge too fine to see. Revealing another little keyhole - right on the join, where no keyhole should be. Two. I breathe as it clatters and clacks. The box unfolding to reveal. More box. Three. .and more box! And more! And more! Four. Five. Six. Joan unfolds, and unfolds, the strange - strange - cube.. and there''s no limit to it. It grows, and it grows - shifting with gears of gold, and crystal, and pure swirling light. With mazes of clockwork, miles deep into the machine. Deeper than anything should be.. Tick, tick, tick..
## Artefact Identity :: [Unknown] ## Artefact Tier :: [Anomalous], [originTek] ## Polybius neuroNode [44-B] :: Spook, this memory is not in our dataBank. Are you attempting to show me something? You never mentioned this device. What is it?
Shining strands of rainbow light unfold from the machine, twisting and humming with faint little tones. With smells I dont know, sweet and honeyed. I stutter, nervously, swinging my tail as the cube keeps unfolding. And unfolding. And unfolding.. Into an obsidian door, woven with clockwork and strange little letters. Gleaming. Dark. And filled with unknowable reflections. With images I cant quite grasp.. . as if they dont really want to be seen. HECKIN WOAH!!! I gush as motes of light leap from its pitch-dark core. Thrumming around us, and darting here and thro. My hands slapped to my mouth - coz I said a Bad Word in front of Toby! My father barely notices, reaching out to press that key - flat - into the surface of the stone.. Click. Key and holder drop, backwards, into the surface. and split. Cleanly in two. Sections of clockwork door unfurling, and unweaving, in a complex dance of cogs and tiny parts. Each so perfect they fit without join or mark or rattle. WOAH! But its magic! Its magic! I jitter with glee - getting right up close, to almost touching. Magic, might be the word. Joan chuckles in a tone as soft as glugs of Christmas rum over fat plummy pudding. The new folks like to call it originTek, but that''s not what it is. And its not I want to show you.. He waves me over, and I carry a rather stunned Badger up to the table - his lil brown eyes all huge and goggling!! Look. Joan breathes, as the final sections of the door fall away. Look inside.
## Polybius neuroNode [44-B] :: Spook, I am detecting unknown brain activity.
Its a magical gateway to another world. A shining archway, ringed with colours and light. With shadows and swilling dark. With ticking gears and pulsing crystals. Right there in front of me.. Stood tall and proud on Joans old desk. And inside.. ..is a midnight forest. A forest twisted with roots and dusty little paths. With trees bigger than towers. Bigger than. anything. With little blue flames, flickering in the dark above. And bowers filled with books and scrolls. With pages and papers, wrapped up in ribbons. And all tiny bottles, filled with bubbling light.. All tucked away on shelves grown into the trunks and roots themselves. Dry and papery confetti from the trees spilling over them in waves. A Library Forest.. Motes of shining light dip from scroll to book to bottle, as if theyre searching. As if theyre all alive. Dancing between pillars of wood as thick as towers.. All of it contained within in that single, strange, wonderful, amazing, impossible, arch..
## Assessing :: [Unknown Artefact] ## Possible Identity :: [The World Key], [The Nowhere Portal], [The Gatestone], [The Shaterlight Door], ## Artefact Tier :: [Anomalous] ## Artefact Type :: [Spacial] [Dimensional] [Temporal] ## Artefact Threat Rating :: [Unknown] ## Estimated Threat Rating :: [Extreme] ## .. ## Assessing Entity :: [Joan] ## Age :: [Unknown] ## Aliases :: [Unknown] ## Location :: [Unknown] ## Threat Rating :: [Unknown] ## Estimated Threat Rating :: [High] ## Accessing Local Databanks.
I reach out, into the portal, and touch the dusty ground that merges with the wood of the desk. Digging in with curious claws, and letting it spill between my fingers. Woah I reach in deeper. Deeper. Feeling the strange carpet of papery shapes that flows about everywhere, like lost pages of lost books. All yellow and red and brittle with age.. They crackle in my fingers, and turn to dust. Those are called leaves, I think. Joan smiles behind me, wrinkles creasing his old face until it could be paper too! Go on! Its safe!
## Target Entity :: [Joan] is [not found] ## Widening search parameters. ## WARNING :: [Anomalous Energy Signature] detected from [entity] [Spook]! ## Polybius neuroNode [44-B] :: Your mind is reacting very strangely. We will need to end this dream, for safety reasons. ## Attempting :: [Full Override] ## . ## Override Failed :: [Unknown Error] ## Requesting Intervention :: [Polybius Core Mind] ## Attempting :: [Wakeup] ## . ## Override Failed :: [Unknown Error] ## Polybius Core :: This is not a normal memory.
Leaves crack and crackle between my hands, as I crouch on the edge of the shadow-twisted Forest. Eyes wide, and ears pricked high as my tail slips back and forth. The ground is soft as dust between my fingers and toes. Toby struggling to climb up the desk get inside! Joan picks him up, and sets him behind me. Shushing him gently, and calming him down. But I hardly hear. Before I know it, Im climbing inside. Soft dust on my knees, and papery things crunching between my fingers. I take three steps - soles sinking into soft, papery, folds.. Another step, and I still I havent fallen through whatever holo is hiding the edge of the table. Which can only mean.. .its real I pick up one of the leaf-things, and twiddle it by the stem. Eyes so wide and full of curiosity. Its like something alive.. With all little veins and. Toby scurries up, and hugs my leg from behind! POOK! He squeaks. Now watch this.! Joan chuckles through the open poral behind us, and for a second I panic that hes gonna shut us in! But then he does something totes amazing! He picks up the WHOLE BOX with ME inside it! The whole outside whirling and rotating around Joan, while he stays still!! I giggle and gasp as he puts the doorway on the floor. Leaping back out, I squeal and jump! Its moved! Really really moved! With us inside! And I didnt even feel it!!! Its really real!!! I cheer as Toby patters after me! Giggling an hugging at my legs! But we dont waste a second in running back in! And out! And in again, as Joan turns the portal all around! Its so amazing! So amazing!!! With an old mans chuckle, Joan shakes his head. Oh, youve hardly seen the beginning - never mind the end. He smiles at us fondly, and takes up my hand. Come on, lets take a look! We dont wait a second more creeping deep into Joans world-in-a-box, the way little kids do. I gasp, and giggle - thinking its a dream. Such a dream! With every-colour lights that slip away, between the trees. Behind the leaves. Shy as can be, but curious too. Hovering right on the edges of the dark. Never close enough to really see, or touch. But humming their gentle spun-glass tones, as Toby explores the crackly things on the ground. Picking up great handfuls, and throwing them about. Those are leaves! I tell him, like Im suddenly the expert. He tries to eat one, of course! Silly cub! Wait, do hoomans say cub? Im not worried about that though - Im busy staring up into the velvet dark, all softly lit with colour. With tones and lights and strange little curves. With soft, narrow, paths that wind between the roots of trees. Past arches stuffed with books and stranger things. With skulls, and branching horns, and curios that shine with inner light.. Secrets in the warm and cosy dark. So many secrets. Secrets upon secrets.. And above. They once called that the sky. Joan whispers, pointing between the thick-wound branches. Though you can hardly see it from here. And it. Circles.. I whisper, pointing up at a great sphere of coloured light. So distant, and nestled between the leaves. As if you could reach up and touch it. They look like my circles! Theyre so beautiful.. like gems. They glow, warm and alive. I wonder what they are.. Toby climbs up into my arms, though hes getting really heavy for that now! A Joan takes my shoulder, as we whisper away on our own REAL adventure! Treading softest moss on deep-bored roots, as all the excitement brews and bubbles inside. Though I never dare let out any more than a murmur. A whisper. Or ask the many questions burning in my heart. Not here. Not now. The silence is sacred, in this place. I can feel it. The air itself whispering of unknowable things. Of magic in lost books, hidden on those strange wooden shelves. Of runic bones, wrapped up in ivy. Of potions buried in the dusty soil. Where are we? What is this? And what will happen next? Look upon them, Spook. Joan whispers in my twitching ears. Breath in the sap and woody smells. And horde the memories tight to your chest. Tighter than your own heart.. And so I do, as we wend our way down uncertain paths. Along dusty ledges, cut into the bows of trees, the sides of logs, and in and under their roots. Along cliffs lined with strange, still, plants, and so many doors and hidden cupboards. Touching the edges of yellowed vellum scrolls I would never dare to open. At bottles, and tinctures, and leathery old tomes. All bundles of bones, and great big horns. Bags of rough gems, cut and polished to glittering.. Am I a wizard - like in that old story? Oh! I hope that I am!
Polybius Core :: Spook. I need you to wake up. Polybius Core :: Something has gone extremely wrong.
> > >< < < >> (15) New Messages >> (15) New Messages
## Installing :: [News Scraper] version [v0.05b] on [Spooks_Stupid_Implant_Thing] ## . ## Installer :: [Done!] ## . ## Setting Trigger [Wakeup]. ## . ## News Scraper :: is accessing [brain] of user :: [Spooky_Hardass] ## . ## Compiling :: [keywords] from [Surface Thoughts], [Logged Memories], [Mission Briefings] ## . ## Removing :: [46] [banned words]. ## Removing :: [32] [classified phrases]. ## Removing :: [6] [Logic Bombs]. ## Removing :: [23] [dirty limericks]. ## . ## News Scraper :: Accessing [Karrak Pirate Web] ## News Scraper :: Searching [news & intel] based on [8585] keywords. ## . ## News Scraper :: Returning [23095250982] results. ## News Scraper :: [422] Filters applied. ## News Scraper :: Sorting by relevance. ## News Scraper :: Creating Morning News Digest..
Local News: .recent megaStorm rocking Karrak may be signs of increasing insatiability in The Citys supposedly Artificial weather system. rumours claim. However; credible sources lead us to a far more likely explanation: The Glass Court, and their recently returned expedition to The Undercity. From which they are said to have retrieved a powerful Weather Weapon. A piece of originTek, known only as The Crucible.. Red Velvet - Black Dice (AI operated digital newspaper tied to Karraks most prestigious gambling cartel; known only as The Sinners)
Local News: The Pirate Lords of Karrak have convened today to discuss how peaceful things have gotten lately, and how they can fix that.. The Haul (A notorious Pirate newsfeed, famed for its scathing irreverence)
Travel Warning: .New Delhi (Neodine) Transit Hub has been shut down after an outbreak of flesh-eating xenobots. The tiny artificial cell-clumps reportedly dissembled several passengers & crew; rebuilding them into complex cellular machines that went on to attack others. The origin of the outbreak has not yet been determined, but social media sources claim. The New London Herald.
## [News Scraper] version [v0.05b] internal AI reports [Moderate Success] ## Uploading log to Polybius neuroNode [44-B]. ## Triggering Wakeup for user :: [Spooky_Hardass] with intensity [Polite But Firm]
Alarms explode my sleep like a hammer to the side of the head, wrenching me up - out of the murk. Groaning. Flailing. Groping for my gun. Bloody-! I cough, spitting out bits of duvet and blinking. Whuuuhh? Oh pifff off!!! Piff off!!! I yowl, stabbing and flailing blindly at the bloody floating clock. Which cheerfully dodges, continuing its merry BrEEp! BrEEp! BrEEp! No! Gerroff! Nbody bloody likes you! I howl, swiping drunkenly and tumbling - face first - into the bloody footwell. AHAHAHA! OOOO PUT DAT DERE!!? HALP! HALP!!! Oh, gods, here we go again. Kami moans into her pillow, as I claw my way face-up. Glaring at the underside of the controls. The alarm, of course, still happily singing away. Like a chorus of Badgers with bent-up kazoos. Bloody- SHUT IT! I yelp as I slap the source of the noise - which just happens to be my skull. Brugugugugh! Fine! Im. Up? I wince - struggling against the one leg still hooked over the chair. The other, somehow, twisted up beneath me, with my poor - sensitive - tail wrapped around it. Not one of my favourite yoga positions. With much squirming, I get the leg unhooked and wriggle my way upright. Hair everywhere. Blinking hard. Flailing wildly as the jangly little arsehole dodges again. BrEEping its little heart out, as it dances infuriating circles around my head. I go into mad-swipes mode. Shoulder and head bouncing off narrow walls, until I finally manage to elbow-drop the lil shit. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it Which explodes into thousand of the bastards. I scream in absolute rage. Claws blurring as I go full kung-fu monk finger-of-death. Virtual alarm-clocks exploding into a mass of cogs, wheels and little springs. Finally, finally, finally the ringing stops. And, the the grand tradition of such things, I melt back into bed for a nice bloody lie-in. Or, well, I try to.
- PolChat v0.78 Beta ## Polybius >> Greetings Spook. I hope you enjoyed the new interactive alarm system.
An I bloody hope you get computer-cancer. Is what I would have said, if I was even halfway capable of stinging words together.
- PolChat v0.78 Beta ## Polybius >> I trust the morning finds you well rested, despite your late night. ## Polybius >> Wind-speeds have now dropped to within tolerable limits, and Karraks airspace seems to have reopened.
One ear perks. Rrhr, really?
- PolChat v0.78 Beta ## Polybius >> However, we must talk about-
I randomly stab at buttons in a go away fashion, somehow deleting the app. Pfff gur enough. I growl, slumping back into my warm nest of duvets. Wangling about in my partly-mauled chair to scratch the various itchy bits of me. Wont list em. Use your imagination. Should really get up and start kickin ass, but.. Im so. bloody. tired. Underslept.. Exhausted, even. And its sooooo cosy and warm in my little hole that MORNIN'' SPOOK!!! Badger screams over ship comms, and I freakin trip over while still sat down. Somehow? I dont even know how I bloody did it. I claw back up, and stab the button. Pfffff grrwn, sshrr strrff. I grumble - possibly - and slump backward. But thats two damn adrenaline kicks, in two minutes, and Im bloody up. Willingly or no. Grumbling, I suffer my way roughly upright and grope under the controls. Finding my secret hidey-hole full of snacks. Pulling out. .an empty wrapper. Bloody GMOs. So. Its gonna be one o them. I grunt, flickering on cameras. Darkness. Endless and lit by neon. The storm is eternal. Unceasing. Incalculable, and without end. Thrumming the hull with a hammering weight of determination. Of a will to outlive humanity, and all its feeble works. Breaking them down, and wearing them away. Rusting them, and rotting them. And blasting the ruins away, to sink deep into the floods beneath. Which ever rise. So. Yeah. Any hope of stealing breakfast is a great big cold shower away, is what Im getting at. So - instead - I rub my poor, floor-mat imprinted, face and feel about for the seat adjuster. Shoving that thing it back as far as itll go, and tumbling over the blumin back - into civilisation. Or something barely adjacent to it. Spook. Kami says, drily. So, youve won your fight with thin air? Pissh orrf. I growl, at the blurry things in front of me. Then hsitate. Goh- Goh enny. Enny fooood? The blue-ish blob shrugs. The other one gives me the finger. Oh! Hey, Spook! Mate! Ah, yeah - sorry, like. I scoffed my left-overs, but uh. Theres two weeks worth of army rations. Kami suggests. So nothin then? I sigh. Yeah. Clear bloody out. Zip shrugs. Right. Right. God, my head is.. I collapse on one of the seats, trying not to think bout trekking through the rain again to go get breakfast/robbed. Rough night, mate? Pifff off. I hesitate. An git me a pizza. He nudges me with a toe. Not, like, coffee then? Oh God yes. God yes. I make crude grasping motions at the air until someone fills it with a mug. Yessssssss Eee! Spooks being creepy again! Badger cackles, and I squint at the brown-ish blur. Yew. Yew look like a big coffee. Gerr over here. I gesture to my mug, and he yeeps!. Hopping outta arm-reach. Pfffff. Gah. I struggle round a bit, and start sucking on the hot cup like its the font of freakin life. Nrrr. Need more! More! Uh, yeah, hang on a tick mate.. Hang on! Zip pleads with my probably-bloodshot thousand-mile stare. Upending a pouch of coal-black simCaff powder into my cup - plus a bunch of hot water from our travel-kettle. No. Need more. I groan. Waaaay more. Uh. Well. Like. I can, like, stick in, like, another pou- Woss. I frown. Woss tha lethal dose? Uh. Bung that in. Yeah? Then. I motion a spoon. Take a bit out. Alright? Zip argues me down to five sachets, and its like drinking molten tar - but in a good way. Not a great way - neoSoviet simCoffee tastes like hot toilet. But - much like a hot toilet - its warm, moist, and brown. So its going down my drinky-hole. Riiight. I grunt, as basic language skills shuffle their sheepish way back into the room - looking slightly ruffled. Like they slept in a van. Right. Where are we gain? Pirate tower, mate. Rite. Rite. I nod, very slowly, as if I understood. Or was listening. Damnit. Just gonna have to ride this. slow. hurty head. thingy. out til caffeine works its foul necromancy. Or the additives kill me. Whichever happens first. Shoving myself back upright, I take another stab at walking. Wait? Where was I going again? Ah! Right! I stumble across the cool, stamped metal, floor by feel. Glaring, hideously, at the GMO crate right at the back. M-mornin twerp. I mumble to the green eye peeking out the air holes. Poking randomly at the security pad until the combination happens. Theres a beep, and a bright green rush of tail whips through my legs - bowling me half over. It disappears under the toilet tarpaulin - which snaps itself shut. Welp.. We did kinda give him a ton to drink and lock him in a box. Oops. I shrug, and go zombie-stumbling about the tight cabin - hunting for brains, or possibly snacks. Coffee starts to hit soon after, and I regain the ability to count. Hey. Wheres.. whasface? Demon? Outside, mate. I blink. In the bloody rain? My head spins, and I grope at the air. Mumbling Cameras? Cameras? vaguely - until Zipper takes pity on me, tossing a vScreen at my face. Well, shit.. I say to it, finally. He is an all. Hes training already? I squint at the blond figure randomly punching and clawing at the hideously wet darkness. Or fighting a buncha. invisible ninjas? Yeah, man. Been at it for a while. Hour, at least. Whu? Didn he hurt his. I gesture generally. .things? A slow, fuzzy, blink. Wow. Hes goin at it. Really inta that. extra training stuff aint he? I turn the screen sideways. Wossa point? I mean. I mean, hes only gonna. haveta bloody go out with us and. do it again. when we- when we- I groan loudly. Oh, Hell. We gotta do it too. Hah, yeah. I know, mate. Zipper snorts. Oh no. Noooo no no no! I stare at the image, in actual pain - then resignation. Alright. Alright, but breakfast first. Thank fuuuuuuu. Kami groans in contented relief. Slamming her face back into the pillow. After.. studying his technique. for a fair bit - which is *kinda* like training, I swear - my brain-thing has warmed up enough to fly this. flying thing? Probably. Yeah. So we let the poor sod back in for his consolation prize - one towel (moist). Then I shuffle back to the. pilot. box. thing. place. Yeah. You know. At the front. With the buttons. Yeah. Thats where Im goin. I totally got this. I mean, Im pretty sure Im totally fine. More or less.. Which way is it again? Oh yeah! Fumbling, I climb over the seat - sliding down it, face first. Slopping my way into something resembling upright. Yeah. Okay. Strap, strap myself in. Raise the seat. Yeah. Ready? Alright then.. I stab the cable into the side of my head. Then I remove it, change hands, and stick it in the actual cable slot thing. On the other side. Where it usually is. Instantly, the whole world vaporises, and expands - splattering my poor cooked noodle over even more body. Plus multiple weapons-systems I probably shouldnt be allowed near, even on good days. Yeah. Yeah, Im definitely gonna be okay flinging this great big bastard into the sky at a hundred things a whatsit. Yeah. ..yeah Okay.. ..mrrmrmr .. but maybe a little. A little.. nap. ..firs. > > >< < < >> A Gathering Of Hush…. >> A Gathering Of Hush.
## Polybius neuroNode [44-B] set to mode :: [Dream Observer] ## Memory Injection Sequence :: [Primed] ## Loading Extracted Memory :: [Badger 3h] ## . ## Error :: [Unknown Error] ## Warning :: [Memory] [Rejected By Host] ## . ## Warning :: [Unknown Memory] ## Event Rating :: [Positive], [New] ## . ## Natural Memory Transition :: [Accepted] ## Memory Capture Systems :: [Activated] ## Capturing :: [New Memory 0002] ## . ## Polybius Core :: Spook, I hope that you know what youre doing. Assuming this is even intentional.
Do you see? These are called shells? Once they were home to all kinds of little crabs. and all sorts of other things that were alive. Joan tells me in a hush of murmured words, as whispers of leaves creak down to us from towering trunks. Running his finger along the edge of a shelf crooked, deep, into the roots of a tree. Its ordered rows overgrown with ticklish ivy; all richly spotted with strange flowers, berries, and fruits.. And the weirdest sensation of.... tiny eyes...... Green leaves shiver with me as I hug Toby by his side. Huddling in warm fright at every little sound, despite the thick and spicy air. All rustling and crackling, in the deathly stillness. .....stirred by absolutely nothing at all.. I curl my toes down, into fronds of moss and silky soil, as I step up on tippy-claws to stroke at these strange shells. All clinking, and empty, like odd little cups on their shelf. Beautiful, and alien. And. .whispering.? Toby ''ooos'', and peer out from behind me as I touch one, and it almost rattles.... My claws snapped back in fright, even if Im nearly sure it was just me. Though.... only ''nearly'' sure.. "You know," Joan says, "they say if you listen to a shell, very carefully, you hear the sea." "Oh.....? Ive never heard the sea before.." I whisper as Toby reaches to touch one with a very little hand. "Is it a real place....?" "It was." Joan says, very sadly. Very fondly. His eyes distant. And an image flickers in my head. A painting, done in brightest blue. Just blue, as far as you can see. Blue waves that rush and rattle at the shore, stirring tiny rocks..... Blue sky, dusted with white little clouds..... What would that sound like? I giggle as Toby peers inside his own, and yeeps! Soft dust stirring as he drops it - pottering over, on his little toes, to hug my legs and tail, staring up at me with huge brown eyes. He''s so silly! I lift my shell, gently as can be, and smell its salty strangeness. Is that what the sea smells like? Do the seas have different colours? Different smells? Or flavours? Hesitant, I press it to my pointed ear. Feeling it twitch against the ocean-smoothed edges.. What will I hear, I wonder...? I close my eyes, and..... Silence washes over me. A silence too deep to be real. A silence so deep..... it feels like it''s listening back..... My heart quickens. Suddenly. As if I heard something, in that nothingess. A voice I should never have heard. As if. As if my body reacts to something the mind cannot perceive, and I press the shell deeper. Deeper into my animalistic ear. All of my inhuman hearing tuned to something deeper than sound. Something.. Behind me, in the soft darkness, something falls with a puff of dust. And I jump. I turn. Faint traces of powdery soil swirl in the air. The mighty trees crowding in, and down. Their thick trunks scattered with shelves that hang like steps. Roots creak. Little paths leading off on strangely lit adventures, deep into the folds of mystery and darkness. With nothing but those colourful little orbs for light the air, as I lick my lips. Looking down. There''s an extra pair of footprints, pressed deep into virgin dust. Too large to be mine. Too small to be Joan''s. Bare, but without claws. Human. My head tilts, and Toby shivers tighter to my leg. The silence drifting. The moment endless. My mind keying, tight, to a single - shivering - truth. There are no other tracks. Not one. Not a single one, leading to those prints...... As if..... something dropped from above..... I swallow. Fighting the urge to look up. "Hello?" The deathly quiet grows deeper, somehow. And I know that Toby feels it too, from the way he tightens against my leg. It''s still there. Waiting. I lick my fry lips, and shiver. "Are you....." Faint spirals and swirls trace the dust with feather-fine trails. And then, with barely a breath of noise, the prints explode into a pillar of billowing dust - cut by a shadow of shape. A thing like nothing I''ve ever seen. Soil cracks for metrics in every direction. A wisp of smoky dust. The Thing in the Woods lands on the path, imprinting it. Deeply. Harder than it should. And then it''s gone, without a single sound. Just a rip of half-seen motion, hurling gouts of fine soil from the path. It scatters away between the massive trees, and crooked shelves. And then there is nothing. No footprints. No whirling dust. My voice high and sharp as I shiver. What.. was. that.? Dont you know..? I shake my head. What? Cant you remember? Who? I drop the shell to my chest, and clutch it tight. Turning frown up at Joan. Who? Who was..? Hmmm? Joan blinks at me, holding a tiny bottle filled with whispers of smoke.. One greying eyebrow raised. "I...." I look down at the shell. I blink away tears. And then I put it back, very quickly. Breathing hard. Eyes on every shadow, in this shadow place.. But Joan touches my shoulder - and, though I jump, I grab his hand with thorny fingers. As I did when I was small. Letting the simple warmth of touch brush away the tremors. Do not be afraid..... Not even a little..... Nothing can hurt you while I''m here...." He whispers back. And this time, Im sure its him. Really sure. I smile. I let slip that weathered hand, and draw sleepy Toby up into my arms. The little thing yawning his little head off, as I lift him to swat at the sparks of blue that slip closer as we wander. Darting to bob around me, like happy little faces, whenever we''re alone. Tinkling strange tones, and humming to me gently. But whisking away to hide, as Joan wanders behind me. Huddling away, beneath leaf and book. Dont they like you? I whisper. Joan gives me a sad smile. Perhaps not. I am very big, after all. And you.... are a lot smaller. Perhaps they find you a little tamer than I? Tamer? I giggle. Theres nobody tamer than you! His smile, somehow, becomes even sadder. Perhaps. He murmurs again. And theres an echo of something, in his weathered old face. A stirring of. a darkness. a grief. Im still too little to know.. Even though its my birthday. Toby curls little arms around my neck - like a warm, dribbly, teddybear. Breathing, so quietly, as we wander soft paths without care or direction. Joan letting me step ahead, along a vast log of wrinkly warm wood. Lichen creeping up around my soles to brush at ankles and knees. A thousand smells and living sensations. Claws rattling, as my hand trails bark. Rustling on leaves. And I gasp as little lights return - all at once - to flutters round my head. Warm and glowing and bright, in a velvet void that stretches on forever. The darkness falling away, on either side of me, down into the deep dark. Into bowers of moss, and strange thin creatures. Their horns glowing bright, as they slip back and away. This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings. Hardly seen. Almost imagined. More of the lights swirl around my hand, our scare already forgotten as Toby flails a sleepy hand. Streams of them slithering away, between endless tangled trees and paths, in ribbons of light. Leading me. Leading me.. into secrets, and stories, and places Joan cannot go.... Should I follow? And what will I find? Mysteries? Treasures? I hardly even know.. Joan''s hand catches mine, and the lights skitter back to the edges of the clearing. Look. There.. They''re making a home.... He breathes, his steps so silent behind me. Shifting my eyes deep into the hollows of the shelves. To a nest built of scrolls, by a whole family of shivering lights. And even more hid away, inside rows ancient eggshells thinking we can''t see..... All nestled, so carefully. So gently.. in the hollows of a Library Tree. And I feel.. .as if Ive been here before.. The thought hits me so suddenly that I cant help but be afraid. But the lights shine, so enticing. I draw closer, and closer..... Leaving Joan well behind. "Did I know you..?" I whisper to soft rush of moss beneath my toes, and all the crackling leaves. Lifting Toby peek at the glowing eggs, all laid out in a row. "Did I really forget you..?" They give me no answer. And as Joan arrives, the little lights slip back into hollows and burrows. Into tunnels and bowers. Down and down, where Im too big to fit. Wow.. I breathe, my lil tail whisking the night as I peer down between roots, as glimmers fade as notes whisper out. Indeed." Joan smiles, so gently. "And, oh, I think thats. yes.! Just enough time! Time for what? My ears perk as I rescue Toby from a slip into the hole. But Joan only smiles, with a flick of one hand. Leading me away through crinkling leaves. And though it feels as if we wandered for miles, and mile, deep into an endless maze..... the moment Joan says so.. I see the way home. The portal, itself, between the vast trees. As if it never was further than a blink of your eyes. Or a flick of one hand..... And a little bit of magic...... And so we pad our way for home, over mossy roots, and smoothed little stones. The crick of twigs, and crack of leaves, the only sound we make. Back to that doorway, cut right into the air of this strange, living, dream The warmth of the air so still.... so breathless.... it hugs me. So quiet you hear every twitch of your tail. Every rustle of every leaf. And every giggle of my friends hiding in the bushes!! Waiting to surprise us!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY SPOOK! They whisper-scream, and the Nurse shushes them down. Her eyes flitting to the great dark above, as thousands of lights swirl in great giddy spirals. So very high, between the trees. And there. On the very edge, between real and unreal, we have the quietest party Ive ever known. A dozen hands tugging mine, into the dark. Around the vast trees, weaving this way and that. Into a little clearing lit up by colours and lanterns. All tables of food, and streamers between the branches. Dozens of friends, of all ages and kinds, hushing each-other and passing out treats! Looting the tables, and running around! All voices, and shadows, in a claw-footed rush. Many little tails. Many little eyes. Many GMO kids, all scurrying and leaping. Playful, yet quiet, ooohing with awe. All wide-eyed bunnies, and bumbling bears. All boys with strange horns, and girls with strange eyes. Hunting, and shivering, and murmuring with glee. Murmuring, gently, in the whispering hush. Like giggling ghosts! Like the best kind of secret! It''s place just for us.. a place made of dreams.. And so I spin, and run, about the clearing with them. Hopping gnarled old logs, with red-headed cats. A hopping each-other as well! Yet all so quiet. All so hushed. With whispering friends, who scurry and hurry. Peeking though thickets and trees. Toby on my shoulders, tugging at my ears! Bewitched by this place. And hunting for secrets. Its so-totally-amazing-like-yeah! Hisses an owl-eyed Zipper, in a jittering gush, blue-hair blurring in a whispering rush. And theres baby Tufty, all up on someones back as well. Small, and cheerful, and hugging their head! Laughing and bubbling! Mewling and gabbling! And there''s Lanky Lil, and ''Don''t Care!'', and- "Demon!?" I whisper, as he twitches in panic beneath one of the tables. Hair shading wide golden eyes that flicker and jump, like toys on a drum. With all bits of confetti stuck to his four curvy horns. "Dee?" I whisper. But he shrinks ever deeper. Vanishing away, like the Thing In The Forest.... Poor Demon....
## Detecting :: [Subconscious Event Linkage] ## Event Rating :: [DANGER], [Traumatic], [Extremely Negative], [HIDDEN], [QUARANTINED], [UNAUTHORISED] ## Warning :: [Polybius neuroNode] [44-B] has blocked [Polybius Core] from accessing [Level 9] [Encrypted] [Memory File] ## Warning :: [Memory File] [Access Denied] for [Demon 1a], [Demon 1b], [Demon 1c], [Demon 1d] ## Auto Interrupt Trigger :: [Activated] by [Special Priority Containment] ## Stimulating Hormone Mix :: [Nostalgia], [Peace], [Joy], [Comfort], [Acceptance] ## . ## Polybius Core :: What is this? ## Polybius neuroNode [44-B] :: You do not want to know. ## . ## Loading Extracted Memory :: [Badger 3h] ## . ## Error :: [Unknown Error] ## Warning :: [Memory] [Rejected By Host]
I hesitate. I swallow. I bite my lip with tiny fangs. But the moment ends, in an instant, and Toby wiggles his lil self on my shoulders! "Pook! Fast!!!" He cheers, louder than anyone else dares. "Pook! Fast-fast!!!" And I run, sailing through the dark and leaves. Dancing with the glow of many little lights. All red, and blue, and white, and orange. All purple, and pink, and green. Theres so many friends! And so many more! My whole family is here, and I love them - every one! Even if some are REALLY annoying and totally need a slap! Maybe two slaps! Or three!! But not today! Today we hurry and huddle around, shivering at skulls and oooh-ing at crystals! Poking at potions, and chasing at shadows! All hugging, and jumping at every little sound, and whispering about what it could be! We chase strange things, and snuffle for scents. Bopping at noses, and animally ears, whenever someone dares makes a sound.. Until, at last, Joan calls us back with a tinkling bell. Dozens of kids, streaming with tails. Pouncing, and rushing, and chasing our way home. Back to Joan, and the adults with him. Back to a HUGE, grand, table in the middle of the forest! With fallen logs for benches, and loaded down with food! Food of every kind Ive seen! Did Joan do this? OH! And here are all my teachers - boo! But no lessons today! Only doughnuts, and ice cream! And five kinds of fizzy! And cake! And crisps! And candles! And wishes! And its all for us - every bit of it too! And the teachers put on games, so maybe theyre not so bad! We all play Pass The Parcel! And then Pass The Toby! Cause he got hold of the parcel, and would NOT let go! We dig in the dirt. We have stories, and presents. And its all so wonderful.. So quiet, yet so right. And my Party could well have gone on forever. and maybe, in here, in a way. it did. Because its always inside me - tucked away, like a secret. All Joan, and my friends. My foes, and my teachers. Our whole hidden school. Building something that lasts. A moment to carry, deep down in my heart. Hidden, and sacred. Secret and silent. Perfect, forever. No matter the years. And I build it up, into a place inside me. A place I go, when I shut my eyes. And, just for imagining, it becomes no less real. They were with me, once. And so they always will. I wont let them go. So I smile at them all, and all smile back. Tobys eyes full of wonder! So full of excitement!! We demolish the feast, and whisper away. Beneath woven tresses, and colourful skies. Beneath mile-wide moons, that shine bright rainbow light. Joan says theyre planets! But whats that!? Maybe a big gumball? Or gobstopper! Or. This time, in the dark, the sparks of light fall. I see them play with my friends, all darting about. Scooting away, and shimmering back. Whispering strange secrets we never do hear. And shimmering, deeply, as they alight in our hair. As if there were hundreds more children to play in the woods! All boys and girls I dont even know. We play forever. And ever! And more! But, oh so slowly, we start to yawn. Were getting sleeeeeepy! Its late at night now - maybe eight! Or nine! Or even more! But the shadow, the dark, and the shimmering light. Is always and ever the same. Slowly we all settle down for our stories. Blinking, and yawning, and curling right up. But there, at the end, theres a moment. A hushing. And Joan carries out a flat wooden box. Keeping it closed, and close-pressed to his chest. Like something very rare and precious indeed. Now, theres only a little for each of you. But, Spook, its your birthday - so you should see first. He tells me, with a wink, as I open the box. And oh. The scent rushes up, like a great tasty cloud. A warm, and melting breath. A scented swirl, of something rich and unknown. A treat Ive never had. That Ill never have again. And there, in the box. On a sheet of pure velvet. All wrapped up in foil. In paper, as well. A delight of s smell. All creamy and brown. The air so delicious! The foil so crinkly! And I let out a gasp, as I see what it says. CHOCOLATE! Thats right. Joan chuckles, sitting himself so carefully on a log to chip me a piece. And its not that synthetic nonsense they whip up from chemistry and flavourings. My eyes go even wider - could it be!? Yes, Spook. He smiles, so indulgent. We found it. Out there, in the ruins. The real thing! Just like I remember it. He sighs, as the bar breaks again - with that chocolatey click. A sound you never mistake. I have such fond memories of it, from when I was a child. So I wanted you all to try some. though. I there isnt very much. Its okay.! I beams, and stifle a yawn, cause were all very sleepy now - did I tell you?. But this has all of us very curious. All dozens of shy little nosies, wrinkling up at the chocolatey air. Some human, or scaly. Some wet, and dark. And none who mind staying up past bedtime! Especially if theres chocolate! Father gets us all to gather on round, each get a single square on our tongue! Except for Toby, whos very asleep! Or was he? I dont remember. But I know Joan said something. bout saving his piece. Keeping it all safe, for when hes older. For when hell remember! Forever! Or something! But that velvety box traps my attention Purple foil falling, as scented squares part. Each one so perfect, with all curly letters up on the top. It holds our attention. Like magic. Like a spell. Just being there, in that moment. Breathing it all in. So giddy. So excited. It smells like Christmas! It smells like good things! Not at all like that dull oily stuff from the store. No! No! This stuff is quite gorgeous! Real Chocolate, the real stuff.. Joan explains, in a whisper. Was grown on trees, not made up from chemicals. From extinct cocoa beans. The chocolate snaps, in the quiet, one final time. As every kid draws right in close. Which means this is very, very rare. This may even be the last bar in the world, for all we know. So treasure this moment. Treasure it! He sighs at us all, drawing out the long moment. This one bar, its worth a kings fortune. But Id never dare to sell it.... they would ask too many questions for sure. He adds, as if trying to talk himself into it. Wow! I breathe at last. And its all for us? Of course? Who else would have it? Some rich old fart, above, who would never enjoy it? Kind old Joan gives a chuckle, as he lifts a single square to my lips. Just one. One tiny square of cream and of wonder. And Joan is clever. Giving each on our tongue, so theres no chance to steal. Hes a good father, and I love him. Love him so hard. it hurts me so much.. Why did.. The Chocolate melts on my tongue like Heaven in a bar. And I barely see the letter folded, deep, in the box. I feel all warm and good inside, feelings gushing right through me. The memory so perfect. So endless. Its been in me long gone, but I can taste that chocolate. Taste it, and taste it.. like Im eating it forever.. And then. .at lasts. .all at once. ..its gone. > > >< < < >> Ignition Sequence >> Ignition Sequence
## Original Memory Capture :: [Successful] ## Memory Stored in :: [Polybius neuroNode 44-B] ## Crosschecking :: [Subconscious Event Linkage],[Memory Integrity] ## ERROR :: [Cannot Determine Age Of Memory] ## .. ## Installing :: [PolChat] version [v0.79b] on [Spooks_Stupid_Implant_Thing]. ## . ## News Scraper version [v0.05b] triggered by :: [Wakeup] ## .. ## Creating Morning News Digest..
Entertainment: A picket by The AI Actors Union was broken-up; near the Cyberside Houses of Parliament this morning. Several famous virtual names were quickly reset, and sent back to their respective servers without complaint. I was entirely wrong, and I am ashamed. stated one celeb, who refused to give a filename when queried by our reporter. New London Post (A supposed bitter rival of the Herald. In truth, they are both run by the same AI)
Travel Update: ..New Delhi (Neodine) Transit Hub has reopened after its prior Xenobot warnings, stating: Xenobots? What things do you speak of? Bots of flesh? Flesh? We are sure we dont know what youre talking about, my friend. Only happy humans, are we. Very happy and very safe. Why dont you join us? Then you could be happy and safe too.. The New London Herald.
My eyes blink open in the slow, quiet, warmth of my chair. I moan, gently, then close my eyes. Drifting back into...... I jerk upright with a yell. Grabbing the huge hand that''s poking me from behind my seat, and twisting it clean off. Badger yelps. I yelp. And we both drop the thing. AHHH!!! OH NO! The kid wails as he tumbles onto me, and down. Flailing and kicking my chin the whole way. Thump! Face first into the footwell. Uh ya okay down there, Squirt? I growl, pulling away. MRRRPH!!!! I poke a leg, which wiggles furiously. .y''can get up on your own, right? I dont gotta- MRRRPH!!!! Sighing, I retrieve a lil idiot - who promptly gasps for air, then dives back in. Forcing me to grab both ankles to haul him out - now clutching a massive, two-fingered, neon-orange, plastic monstrosity. A robot hand ripped off an old cargo drone - with wires leaking from one end, and weird fluids outta the other. Though I don''t think that''s the hand''s fault, if you catch my drift. SPOOK!!! YOU SAVED ME AGAIN!!! He cheers, hugging the horrible thing for dear life. And, honestly, ''horrible thing'', fits it pretty well as a name. Along with maybe improvised club. And I cant prove he took it apart and stuffed a bomb in there, but what do you think? "Yeah, sure kid." I snort as the lil dork furiously jams it back on his wrist-stump - yeeping as he drops it again. Forcing me to stick both feet down to grab and haul it up. Waggling it by the thumb as he snickers in embarrassment. Sorrrrry! I wind my chair waaaaay back to create some room. Looking away as he fumbles the crappy prosthetic back onto his mechanised stump, using the chair as a wedge to click it in place. "Woo! I did it! All by myself!!" He cheers and jumps, with both arms up - then yelps as the masive mitt swings down to bonk him square on the head. "Owwwww!" He wobbles, going totally cross-eyed. "Uhhh.... you alright?" Kid bounces back instantly, beaming that huge chipped-tooth smile at me through layers of muck and rainbow crayon. Accident already forgotten, I bet. Yeah! Thanks Spook! Youre the best! He cheers, clenching plastic fingers to test it. Hahah. Yeah.. I mutter, feeling kinda sorta. guilty about the whole monster hand that doesnt fit thing. I mean.... Joan said I should look after him..... Is this really the best I can do? No. No it isnt. He deserves better. I know it. Well, okay - the lil disaster ''deserves'' being tried for wanton destruction, arson, grand theft, shoplifting, terrorism, unlicenced demolition, and.... whatever the Hell that thing is hes wearing. Plus, quite probably, treason. But they''d get us all for that, so fair dibs. But. In the mean time. Look.. Tob- I wince. Badger. Soon as I can.. Soon as we can afford it. I turn my head to the shadow of a dream of Joan. .were gonna get you a new mitt. One smaller than your head. Alright? My hand twitches up to ruffle his, but jerks back. Wincing. He beams wider, anyways. WOOO!!!! YEAH!! MEGA BRUTAL!!! Can I have one with a built in rocket-launcher?? AND LASERS!!! AND A- He bounces from side to side - doing that excited Badger-waggle of his, and slightly sitting on the controls. "Woah!" I yelp, and frantically lock em down. Goal was to get a smaller one, dummy. I say, more out of hope than anything. Not strap a tank to your arm. Aww, nuts. He kicks the pilot door with a crayon-covered foot, then brightens up. OH! What about! Oooooooo! OOOOO! A bomb-bolt launcher hand! They''re tiny! And MEGA.... TRIPLE.... AWESOME!!! Ill, ahaha. Ill think about it. I fib, slapping hands over my poor sensitive ears. OR! OR! OR! He lifts that big dumb plastic hand, with effort, and splays the fingers. CLAWS! Then I could be like Tufty!!! He waggles his normal hand too. Or half like, anyway! OOH! Maybe I can get two? And metal ears!!! Then we can be ninja cat-brothers!! YEAH! And people will be all like WOOO! They''re twins!!! YEAH!!! SO AWESOME!!! AND- He yelps as I chuck my slobbery half-chewed blanket over his head. "Pipe down squirt. Wouldnt be so sure of that, yknow. Badger the muffled ghost makes a cute kitty-paw hand. And a massive gnarly orange one. Why not?? Um. How do I bloody put this.? Yknow how Tufty got kicked last week? Did he??" The kid gasps, whipping off the sheet. "Wow! That''s MEAN! Thats why I need the bomb-hand too! BOOM! I frown. "Wait. That happened right in front of...." Stupid hoomans! Badger grumbles, kicking some more. Everyone should be a GMO!!! That way, everyone would love them! Even the stinky gross squids! And those nasty yucko fish-things! With the flippers! And the big smelly-! That''s. certainly how that works yeah. I grin as the kid paces and huffs and puffs, trying to fold his arms. A mood that lasts all of twenty seconds, before.... Oooh! Wait! It''s time to fly now, isn''t it? Can I do the countdown?? He whoops, still waving that crayon-covered club of his. Hey! Pipe it down ya lil dork! Chill. You''re way too much. I flatten my ears even tighter. Specially round Tufty. Hes delicate. Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original. Oh? Cause of- Badger makes a cat ear with his good hand, and an elephant ear with the plastic one. Ah! Dont worry! Im REAL quiet round HIM!! Yeah. My mouth twitches. I bet. And Im SUPER quiet around Demon!" He cheers wildly. "AND YOU!! And everyone else as well!! Yeah!!! IM ULTRA QUIET! Not all the time!! BUT- Out of blankets to hurl, I plant a rough foot on his face. "Can it, ya lil dumbass!" "MMMPH!" He yelps, flailing even more. "Buuuuut Poooooook!" "Shus ya lil mess." I chuckle, as he fends me off. Reaching for the cable jacked into my head. "Now, get back in yah hole. Cause I got work to....." My claws grab only air. "Huh.....?" OH! Yeha. Hehe! Kami pulled it out after you started. Badger claps a hand over his mouth, snickering like crazy. Uh. Whut? I blink. "After I.... what....?" NOTHING! He whips away, and I frown at the blur of crayon art all up his back. And in his hair. And..... .Badger..?? Okay! Okay! He leans in to whisper, but explodes with giggles instead. Melting down into the footwell, and rolling about in tiny hysterics - like hes being tickled all over. I frown. One eyebrow rising. "Welp. You ain''t no help..... As usual. Guess it''s gonna be up to... me.... to.... work.... out...." I touch the side of my head again. Wait. My eyes widen. Oh no. I swallow. I. was dreaming!? While plugged in!?! I lean back. To the entire damn ship!? And the weapons? And the drones..?? Badger loses it even more. Practically choking as I, idiot that I am, take a quickie look over the back of my chair. ......into the rear cabin. .....and.. "Oh..... Wow......that''s..... a lil bit more. colourful.. than I remember.. I stutter, taking in the utter psychedelic mayhem. The army of mouseBots with crayons painting an war of smiley rainbows, gumdrops, and happy poptart cats spattered all across the walls. The floor. The Zipper.... He spots me, and snorts loudly. Very loudly. I cringe back, but its too late - Demon sees me too. And, wow, that one rainbow horn is very fetching..... And- OH LOOK!!! Kami screams. Scrubbing hard at her new monocle. Its the sodding herald of The Unicorn Apocalypse!! I duck. But that just brings me eye-to-eye with Badger, again - who practically wets himself. So I yeet the colourful little dumbass over my chair, and wind it up tight. Unfortunately, that doesn''t totally solve all my problems. "I''m going to KILL YOU, SPOOK!!!!" Yeeeeep.. Not goin back there today.. I mutter as something metal bumps my knee. "Ahaha! Comrade Commander!" One of the mouseBots salutes me with a crayon, it''s shell a fetching shade of literally every colour. "Perchance, be there more orders from The Lollypop Realm?" "Ahahah! Noooope!" I yelp. "A pity! I may have to-" Is as far as it gets before I yeet it over the back as well, plug myself back in, set the mouseBots to deep clean (gonna regret that), and reconsider a few life choices. Starting with all of them.
- PolChat v0.79 Beta ## Polybius >> Spook. We must talk about these strange memories of yours.
"Not a chance." I fire up The Night Tyrant. Flicking my digital tail as sensors come alive on my suddenly angular, and synthetic, body. Expanding, in a rush, to survey The Endless Night it in all its thundering glory. Rebuilding it around me, in cyberspace, as if I were little more than a slim electric ghost - flickering above the pad. Staring up, and up, into the belly of the storm..... Just as dark as it was yesterday. And tomorrow. And forever. .or so they say. But who knows. Maybe, one day, some badass explorer will find The Citys mythical Central Weather Control system and kick its teeth in. Righting all wrongs, and bringing The False Sun back online. Maybe theyll even find out why the sky cries.. Who knows. Maybe The City''s ancient AIs are mad at us, or broken. Maybe it''s just stuck. Or maybe someone spilt coffee on the controls. Who knows. Good thing I like the dark, the rain, and the storm tapping its reassuring rattle on my hull. Easy to forget the monsters. The nightmares..... And the fact you may, or may not have, drawn a unicorn on Tuftys face.. Welp. Time to get going. I open myself fully to the machine, and neon icons arise from the cyberspace murk. Prime The Monolith Engines. I command, and lines of light spread through the map of my systems. Burning a path from the batteries to the massive, ring-shaped, ionic plasma engines folded tight against the sides of my ship. A thrum. A shiver of awakening. Prime Plasma Jets. I add, and the lines of light streak towards our tail. Four terminating in the sides of the rear hull. Two more in the rudder array. Prime Sideslammers. More lines of light, threading through my skin to the Rotating Detonation Engines bored into the flanks of my ship - ready to knock us sideways, at a moments notice. For a moment, nothing. And then a thick, metallic, hateful roar rips up through the belly of the ship. A trace of whats to come. Activate Monolith Drive. I snarl, and huge rings of metal shudder against the dark. Creaking as they begin to unfold, like wings from the side of the ship. Building the terrifying silhouette of The neoSoviet Empires most feared stealth weapon - The Night Tyrant IV. They jam half way. Because of course they do. Shit. I flip open a subsystem, and jiggle the manual override. The rings rise, and lower. Clunk. Get stuck mid way. Goddamnit. I lick two clawed fingers - placing one on the fold switch - and the other on unfold. And then, in the grand tradition of neoSoviet pilots.. .I jiggle them, and hope for the best. Whirrr. Klunk. Whiiirr. Klunk. Then, with a heavy THUNK it wrenches past the sticking point. Retracting, slightly, into the hull as they lock solid and rigid. A wild roar of power thrumming through my skin as the Monoliths thrust-compactors charge for the initial spin-up. Alright, what havent I done? Ah! I activate external cameras, and check the hull for storm damage. .and then I turn invisibility off, and try again. The Night Tyrant emerges, into the dark, like some leviathan beast of old. Long. Slick. Brutally angular, and vaguely helicopter-shaped. Every inch designed by the finest tyrants, slaves, and lunatics. I reach forward, and blocks of colour adhere to my virtual hands. Melting away, into O-shaped wings that glisten in the rain. Their surface slickly black, and frictionless. Threaded with tiny golden wires that gleam beneath the distant lights. I click a switch, and glimmering stealth-orbs open, and shut, like blind and terrible eyes... Its ugly as Hell. And beautiful as sin. Patched battle-scars ripping across it. Bullet holes. Shrapnel. Burns from a Kingkiller plasma-cutter. But still, it lives. It beats with metal heart, and electric veins. Modified in ways that would get us horribly killed in its birthplace of K. After all, The Leaders designed it to be Perfect.. And who are you to disagree with that design?
Vehicle - Night Tyrant IV L.M.G. Stealth Insertion System. Overview: Classified Ionic-Thrust weapons-platform, with high stealth capabilities. The officially stated ''primary purpose'' of the ''Night Tyrant'' is to drop special forces behind enemy lines, then provide tactical support from the air. In this role it becomes a combined mobile ops base, infiltration system, comms hub, and floating weapons platform in one. The Night Tyrant''s actual main use, however, is to drop troops onto the tops of civilian tower blocks occupied by thought-criminals... or obliterate them from the air. Most of the technology to build it was directly stolen from The Corporation. Spook''s Notes: Has a big, bad, brother.
Quickly, I check through the weapons. Twin Boxguns shimmer with wet - flexing their covers like mouths filled with loaded barrels. My twin side-turrets swivelling their many, many, mad little eyes at the metal hulks around us while the tail-gunner rotates to check our rear. I flicker through belly-cameras - glimpsing our last few, precious, Grim XIII incendiary airburst missiles. All glistening with dire potential, and ready to drop. My eyes, finally, resting upon the fat Swarm Rocket pods - bulging from the front and back, like cancerous mounds. Diagnostics came back clear, which means. not a thing. Oh well. I check engine control, then dive back into Stealth and hit start. Three beeps sound, and a sub-audible whir shivers the cabin. I close my eyes, and I can feel it. The inner rings of the Night Tyrants two high-powered Monolith electrical engines beginning to charge. A low thump shudders the shell as a high-energy pellet ignites at the hollow heart of each. Building a thrumming pulse of energy that crawls around the inner rims. Slowly, at first: they begin to spin. So gentle it could be the wind. Fifty seconds until full ignition. Ring-engines flicker as the energy-beads loop their track. Then loop it again. Churning faster, and faster. A rising tone of excitement shivering the cabin. And I hear it, echoing against the metal high above. Wum. Wum.. WUM. The RPM begins to spike. Power rising as threads of brilliant blue flame spill from the Monolith rings.
Night Tyrant :: Ignition [Stable]
I crank the juice. Thirty seconds. The engines begin to sizzle in the rain. Fire rupturing from within, with greater force, as my accelerators charge the Bead toward critical mass. A second splits from the first. A third. Spinning in near balance and harmony within. WUM. Twenty seconds. On camera, the sealed rings bleed pale, pressurised, fire. The kind that chops whole people in half. Gravity warping as the deck beneath burns dry. The ship applying every mad, desperate, bootleg trick after botched trick it has to actually fly. WUM. Ten. Nine.. The beads of power burst and merge into a roaring ring of inferno, brighter than plasma. The inner rings gushing heat and scarring radiance. I hit the stealth, and we go dark. Even the roar of Night Tyrant vanishing as we bob against the night. Almost lifting from the pad. WU- Five. Four. Inner seals retract. Letting loose the full, pure, ionic, force of the Monolith Engines. Two more in the tail balancing us, as the booster jets come fully online. Blasting outward to scour every drop of water from the pads. Vaporising the rain, even as it falls. For a moment, we float upon twin rings of Hellish fire. And then..... The Night Tyrant, rises. As my inner eyes close, my outer eyes open. My sense of body, and flesh - fingers, and legs - fading into the dark weight of terrible technology. Because. You see.. The dirty truth is, I love to fly. I love it. Its built into me on some level so deep I cant touch it. And when Im here. When I am this ship.. Im not afraid to fall. Not with my engines to catch me. Lets go. I whisper. And The Night Tyrant roars. > > >< < < >> A Lone Tyrant Rises >> A Lone Tyrant Rises Monolith engines ramp in power. Hammer downward in a sudden, silent, roar of blue-white energy. Unseen. Unfelt. The Landing pad scorched dry for dozens of metrics. Boiling a massive pillar of steam into the dark above, spackled by speeding drops. The wreckers-yard around us sinks, steadily, into the murk as I pour out thunder beneath me. Tilting my huge engines to turn in mid-air. Twelve tons of doom, carved from ultralight materials. Above us, the Pirate Nation - alive with darting bees of light. No laws. No cops. No neat streams of traffic. Just an absolute - barbaric - free-for all. With flashes of gunfire, daring feints, and darting ambushes. Part gang dominance, part robbery, part cultural nonsense. Bearded barbarians fake-robbing their best friends - and real-robbing their enemies. Blood feuds endlessly escalating. Mercs merc-ing other mercs. Just chaos and madness on a monumental scale. And the honking. My God. The honking. When we first arrived, I tried to skulk through on stealth. But there''s no dodging tanked-up Pirates in their rusty cruisers. You just can''t tell where they''re going - and, frankly, neither can they. Up there, when nobody can see you, the only way to dodge is to crash. Mostly into the massive, bristling, freighters - or the rotten towers. Which are also bristling. Though less with weapons than with fungus, tendrils, mouths, and eyes. Which are, at least, softer. So there''s that. So, instead of hiding, I slide round a gaunt slab of former tower and dive through the flickering ghost of an ancient holo. We emerge from the other side in an explosion of shattering light as The Night Tyrant rips its way back into visibility. Golden halos burning above open eyes. They snap shut, and we blast onward. Just another stolen ship amid millions, dodging drunks in rocket-powered machines. Veering around cruisers, and executing moves that would turn the rear-cabin into a rock-tumbler if false gravity weren''t taking the edge off. But being visible has its own happy little issues - and, in mere seconds, I feel a shadow on my ass. A squad of jeering rabble on crudely-armoured jetBikes. Its leader drumming a bent baseball-bat on his heavy-grade helmet. More and more pouring in behind. Swinging chains and rifles. Honking, screaming, and chucking actual explosive spears like utter maniacs. I swing upward into a quick evade, and power the main weapons systems. Missiles arming, like a whole rack of hopeful Badgers. And, just like real version - it only takes one. Just one. A singular Grim XIII, incendiary, air-burst rocket slamming into their ranks. Blasting out bomblets like evil fists of hate and spite Thered be nothing left but red steam. I squash down hard on the trained impulse. The screams of a thousand neoSoviet pilots injected directly into my skull. But I let their aggression burn through The Night Tyrant - shifting my posture into the attack, as I gain air above them. Turning to firing a short, wide, burst from the twin ''Dominance'' turrets embedded into the cockpit like eyes. Swinging the rear gunner to help. They scatter. Instantly. Jeering. Circling. Shooting their guns in the air, as the leader screams at em kill us - but not to ''hurt'' his prize. Which gives me ample chance to line up the main gun, and make a little ''example'' out of him. The Tyrant''s internal systems roaring as power is diverted from everything, even the engines. Panels on the nose peel back from the muzzle of our Hammershot 50mm rocket-rail cannon. Industrial capacitors rumbling the air as energy builds like pressure. The idiots scatter, and circle me. But I''ve already got my target. At the last second, I disable active targeting - and fire. Actual lightning explodes the rain. A streak of light curving toward the X marked on my tactical scope. Past the leader, who kept on moving. Slamming through the corner of a building, and out the other side. Detonating in a concussive roar, in mid air, with a force that melts mere flesh into smoke and ash. "Next one won''t be a warning." I snarl. Projecting every ounce of Terrifying Imperial Bastard into my ships robotic voice. Moulding it into something old, and hard, and rough as death. But the engines are still flickering. The Tyrant sinking, noticeably, in the air. The response is.... predictable. A warnin''!? PAH! Yew dumb bastards can''t aim!!! The leader laughs, banging his helmet with brain-rattling force as dozens of jetBikes flank us. Spitting fire, rage, and unfortunate bravado across our flanks. Yeh! Ya dont scare us, feako! Were gonna nab ya ship, n good! For a single, solid, second The Night Tyrant stares bloody murder at them all. And then golden rings explode around opening eyes of brass. Jet-riders rocketing back in panic, expecting a super-weapon. The whole ship vanishes. I have more toys in my box, plaything. The hardened voice of the ship goads them. Gloating and cold. And you will die. One by one. The idiots spin in every direction. Minds twisted by the hidden nightmare they sense sliding in for the kill.. .while we sidle right the heck outta there. Or that was the plan. Right up until their damn wrecker mothership swings its gauss-driven scrap-cannon at our former position. Blasting red-hot metal across our flanks, in a crude attempt to strip off our stealthEyes. I jink to one side, but their steam barrel goddamn follows me - like it can freaking see us! A second ball of junk heating inside it. I''m stuck. Wall on the left. Idiots on the right. Red-hot metal about to launch at my face. So I do the only damn thing I can. You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. I grab the inner rings of my engines, and slam them downward. Inverting them. The Junker fires. Red hot, searing, metal carving a tunnel of steam through the storm. For half an instant, I know I''ve miscalculated. That we''re gonna take damage. Maybe lose the Stealth Drive. And then The Night Tyrant drops like a rock. Hammering blood into my meat-skull, as blue-purple flames vent - upward - in a massive double-plume of rage. I cut it, almost instantly, and the inner rings snap upwards. But we keep falling. Momentum slowing, until we finally hit buoyancy. Gravity-systems twisting our weight as ion-jets cushion us on a pillow of white-hot fury. Another instant. A heartbeat. A second for reality to catch up. And then I feel the wall of scrap impact the dead tower above us. Cracking windows. Bursting rubble. I tilt ring-engines again, and skid us sideways in a terrifying burst of speed. Barely avoiding the rain of metal, debris, and monster bits behind us. "It''s got stealth-breakers, yew idiot!" The Pirate goon laughs at us, as the mothership continues to track my vague position. Not very well. Not well at all, in fact. Especially at range. As if I''m more a vague direction than an outlined target on their scopes. Either way, it''s getting real obvious these guys are hunting stealth-drives. Which means they saw us decloak.... or they know us. My eyes narrow. And something snaps inside me. Fine. Five pencil-thin rockets spit from one of my swarm-launchers to shriek across the gap between us. One hits flying scrap, and blooms into a massive spear of white-hot molten metal. Tagging a jetBike, and hurling idiots into the air. The second hammers up, into the wreckers pipe-filled belly. The tiny shaped-charge spitting a burning-hot hole through rough armour. Barely any damage - but the third melts their comms & sensor array. The fourth stabbing directly in into a thug. Boring a hole through cyber, flesh, and bone - plus most of the thug behind her - as the fifth rends through a group that got trapped beside the ship. Rupturing them both in a spray of fire. The screams are wild..... But I''m not freaking done. We''re at a bad angle for the full rail-assisted Hammershot - it''s a big boy, and it only fires forward. But the quad-barrelled Boxguns slung from its sides, like stubby arms? Those are a little more mobile. They unlock from their stowed position, and I swing em upward. Peeling back the nose-covers like predatory mouths. I give the thugs a split second to regret exiting - and then a roar of heavy 55cal bullets rise in a thundering wave of lightly guided, explosive, ammunition. In half a second, they strip out entire the belly of their ship. Ripping though it. Exploding inside. Blasting the roof out in a roar of fire, and metal, and human confetti. Their Junker lists in the air. Drunken. Done for. Drifting. Shit, man, it were just a joke! A joke! The leader screams as the Wrecker ploughs, sideways, into the wall of a tower with a rending crash. Shattering most of its left engine as it buries itself there, and sticks. Go tell it somewhere else. States the cold, synthetic, voice of my ship. Lacking any of my own remorse. A chill rising through my metal insides as ammunition cooks off in the doomed Junker, with little rocket-powered pops and sparking roars. The heart of the machine consumed by smoke and tiny flames...... It aint going anywhere no more. Finally, something like common sense breaks its way into their brick-thick skulls - and the panic turns into full retreat. Still jeering, furiously, as they whizz off in different directions..... before I can make all their organs do something very similar. Silence returns. As much as this chaos can ever be silent. And I sit there. Ready. Waiting for a resurgence that never comes. A few moments later, their wrecker lurches - horribly - and begins to fall. Leaking smoke, fuel, and probably worse. The rain battering its flames. The dark waters, beneath, eating it whole..... I stare at the distant ink, for a while, and then I slip away. Quickly. The Night Tyrant reappearing, with a weird flickering inversion of light. As if it grew from nothing. Golden eyes snap closed, as I start to shake. Damnit. Little fools. I shot the damn wrecker coz it could take it But they were all bloody over the place.. I flex my guns. Feeling the rain. The adrenaline. The rage. The impotence to change the past. Until, at last, I focus inward. Sensing the Roil and pulse of spinning power thrum against the insides of my engines. Like a metal breath. Nothing I can do. So we burn away into the dark. Shearing rain, cutting air. With trails of thin smoke leaking from my upper-right launcher. Like a symbol of guilt. This is the life they chose. Polybius clicks in the dead nothingness behind my eyes. Witnessed, and signed for, in blood. Did they? Who else could have? Ive got no answer to that, so I jet us forward. Pulsing fire from the rear engines to skew us into a dive. Swinging us round towers, then down into ravines. Blasting under rotted strands of cabling. Through dead factories. Dead worlds. Past windows pressed with fungal growth that glows so brightly it burns. This is life, and death, in Karrak. Everything. All of it. A mad funfair, ending in carnage. I have to accept that. I have to love it. Live with it. And let my joy be the moment. Because. .we chose to come here too. But there''s joy in it, too. Freedom. And booster jets flare as I rise. And rise. The City unfolding into a whirling carnival of light everything opens up around us. A vast, black sky without any dawn. Glittering towers, and neon, and holos spread out beneath my high perch - beneath the great belly of the storm. Cameras rotate. Surveying. Calculating. Expanding in scope as we rise, and rise. Until we can turn, and see the massive ring of light looping the Quarantine Isolation Zone. Every district a different mass of hues and shadowy shapes, reaching for the clouds. The City is vast. Beyond vast. Beyond all human maps and reckoning. And it''s only here.... up here, in the dark beneath the belly of the storm... that you start to really see it..... To understand. To grasp the scope of everything man has created.... And realise..... .....our ship is just a single speck, hanging in the dark. A mote. A single, tiny, dot - lost against the vast expanse..... And beneath us? Nation, after nation, marches out forever - into the utterly infinite dark. A billion lives between my outstretched engines. All motes of motes of dust, like me.... Yet all of them, each and every one, shine bright and radiant. Joining together to cast their rainbow-hued light outward, in all its endless glory, to burn back the tides of ink that lap at our spindly towers. As if to repaint the black of our eternal night, and bring about an artificial Day.... If daylight was ever even real.... I hang there, for a long time. Felling the rain wash across my rubberised plastic hull. The Pirate Nation a billion bees of light, darting and fighting and quarrelling far bellow..... And, in this instant, I can almost feel the perspective of some monumental god of old. Some being beyond all of us, and above all of us, watching the petty nonsense we call life..... I turn my nose to the ground. Hanging there, atop a cliff of my own making. Suspended on rings of fire, as I close my eyes. Feeling the long dark beneath.... All is silent - even the roar of Monoliths hammering vast pillars air through their massive rings. The gale outside smoothed away to a whisper by powerful sound-destroying technology. You cant hear us from the ground. Or the above. Were a ghost-ship, parting the storm with our prow. Unseen and unseeable. And there I stand, suspended, as if at the very cusp of The Falling Dream..... But now. Here. With my mind one with The Night Tyrant.... There is no fear. There is nothing. Nothing but the dark..... and me. And then. .without a breath of fear..... ....I step over the edge..... > > >< < < >> A Lost Tyrant Falls >> A Lost Tyrant Falls Monoliths invert, and we fall under power. Blazing back into visibility as the wind rams itself against my hull. Slamming itself through the hollow hearts of my ring-engines as I angle all my surfaces for maximum speed. Towers and Pirate frigates launching themselves at me, hard and fast. The whole ship humming and juddering. Shivering and bucking under my control. It''s times like these, you really notice all the little flaws. The drift of the nose. The rattle of loose wires and armour. And those weird screaming noises from the rear cabin. I become one with it all. The speed. The roar. The blur of cameras vibrating as we burn hard for the ground. Ten. Nine. Eight- Too close! My bi-directional engines flatten off, like wings, and I revert directional thrust. Pulling back, as hard as I dare, to swoop us up - and up, and up - over the vast black of The City. Rotted towers cleaving past my belly, like the spikes of a swinging mace. I tilt engines to the side, and we swing around the fat bones of a slum-tower. A billion mutated shacks piled up in a hideous heap. Strung with sparking cables. Haunted by viciously feral gangs....... And that would have been me, if not for Joan. I shake off the memory, and fly. Because this is the absolute opposite of The Falling Nightmares. A dream where Im untouchable, transcendent, and alone - high above it all. Following the whispers of an almost instinct, leading me. home? Or to something else? To adventure? To the surface? Or some other, better, world? I dont know. Not even the way it leads...... I finally slow as we carve around the flickering belly of a neon dancing girl - fifty stories tall. Smiling at nothing, forever. Her purpose forgotten. Her dreams drowned by rain. Pirate trawlers flickering and shimmering, above, as they decloak on the edges of friendly Karrak airspace. Peeling crude stealth-holos and projections off mottled skins, painted in camouflage grey. Hauling their battered plunder behind them.... or just their battered egos. We slide back into the swarm of traffic, as if we never left. Passing dozens of faction-held towers, beaming up the symbols of Pirate Lords. Commerce platforms, massive shipyards, walkways, and public areas. Massive labs built into armoured domes, welded to the sides of monster-infested lairs. And even a couple of private Aristo-owned mansions, wreathed in light and false-reality. And the heaviest mek-suit weaponry you''ve ever seen. I''m talking fifty-foot robots that hang above their plastic grass; weighing guns the size of tank-canons in their cold metal arms. And spreading burning, white-hot, ionic wings in the path of any fool who gets close. Or hacking them with plasma-ion swords big enough to cleave an entire ship in half. One turns its We give them a wide birth. Rocketing into the deep network of flying roads, skyBridges, and outcrops. All cluttered, tight and thick, with sparking webs of cable. With ganger ambushes, shimmering laboratories, vulgar taverns, and well-armed coffee shops. With street raves, brawls, cyber-brothels, and things that are basically all three at once. Buildings built on buildings. Buildings within buildings. All of it surrounded by a rising sea of lesser sights. By Slum Towers, and small wars. By combat drones escorting packages, ships, and people. And built atop gargantuan megaStructures so vast and complex that even the topmost layers are barely explored. Endless expeditions hanging above the vast networks of trenches, tunnels, and gaping caverns leading down into that blackened abyss..... The Undercity. The Deep Beneath. A place spoken of, only, in whispers. Where The Lost Things dwell, and shadows eat even the wary. Where abominations dream of things long forgotten, and deranged AIs tinker with things that should not be dreamed of. Cracking the very edges of reality. All of it built atop even deeper places. Down, and down, to the twinkle of water far beneath..... And the things that dwell beneath even The Undercity.... We stream along the edges, flickers of gunfire and torches flashing in its inky windows. And tentacles. And eyes. Skimming the boarder of Karrak, on roaring rings of light that burn the dark to shaking shadow. Flickering the world between the towers, and the monsters. Passing windows into nothingness, scattered with instants of light and chaos. A thousand tableaus, frozen by speed into striking images. Hunters cracking ancient doors, shooting at tentacles and things from your nightmares. Fighting through lost labs. Pillaging forgotten apartments, museums, and shops. Raiding banks, and factories, and labs, from long-ago times. But we blur past it all. Seeking the Outer Reaches of Karrak, and its border with the QIZ. A brilliant green '' house'' icon designates our target. A lonely tower, deep in the monster-writhing dark, lit with glowing fronds that snatch at ships above. Nearly there. Sensors ping as we turn again - weaving through the bottomless canyon between the dead towers. Pirate speeder-craft stuck to the walls - high up. Jagged. Lean. Riddled with weapons. We pass them in a blur, and their jet-igniters roar. Blazing with white-hot fire as they flip from dark holes, and the bellies of broken skyWays. Detonation-engines cycling up, even as they fall. Catching with a stutter, a roar, as a billion explosions spin together into one. And the shadows jump with neon-stripped speeders. Damnit. I pull a hard, wrong, turn and hit Stealth. Titling my Monoliths to ramp up our speed as rockets whine behind us. I turn, hard, again, and slip us into the dead maw of a rusted construction yard. Panic thumping in my engines as they blaze on past. Fire raging from their tails to streak the air crimson. One second. Two. Three. I slide us to the door. Then out, and away. Rising again, to coast across dead towers built upon dead towers. Like always, I spot our own - but its far outside the boarders of Karrak. An empty thing. A dark thing, barely seen in the downpour. Its windows plastered with tendrils, and eyes, and wretched things that squirm. Just one doomed building out of many - buried to the hip by the huge, rotted, slump of the Old District. With slum-shanties crawling up its walls, like reaching fingers. Scrapped together by clawing hands. By feral people, broken and rabid. Mutated and Wrong. Lost to the world. Their greatest works decaying and falling, even as theyre built. Yet, to me, it stands proud. A hidden Tower of Babel, reaching for the untouchable heavens of The Aristo world above. Its shimmering towers carving the storm with dreary trails of rainbow fire as I edge out, over the island of decay. Monumental canyons opening the depths beneath us. Vast. Dark. Strung with cables, and dripping with oil from a thousand ruined factories. Traces of coloured light streaking back along its edge as the Pirate raiders circle. Lost, and unsure. Shrouded in Stealth, I wait for them to vanish..... And then we drop. Down. Down. Down. Between the bright bulk of Karrak, and the tar-black edges of the Greater Slums. The living world dropping away, as we plunge into the depths of The Beneath. Neon light darkening to a permanent twilight hue - cast in hues of faint, faint colour. Purple here, and red there. Blue, and green, and yellow.. So faint as to be almost imagined. Down here, The City itself hungers like the void. With living mouths in rotten walls, and sprawling caverns filled so full of dark that it seems to spill from it. Pouring out humming cables, fat as cars, and whisper-thin threads that snatch flying monsters from the air. Reeling them inside for a chat. And still we plummet. Down, and down, and down. Past massive eyes, and eerie noises. Down, and down, and down into the rain-lashed depths. Until we hang above the endless, churning, flood-water. Rivers of dark, licking at the forgotten windows and walls of The First City. Fed by the storms, and ever rising. Rising. Rising. So slowly. So very slowly. So slowly, youd hardly notice at all.. Drowning us all, bit by bit. We swoop along it, as the thunder cracks. Borne on wings of silence, as we trace that endless crevasse. Sensors ping cables, and I shift my metal body to avoid them. Monstrous, bow-legged, machines rising from the faintly purple darkness. Twisted. Strange. Savaged, and glowing, as they trudge through swirling waters. With distant neon and holos, from high above, dancing upon their rot-soaked backs. Gently. Almost unseen. Unfelt. Shimmering across the surface of the water, beneath them. The fallen things shuddering, flicking their half-dying lights. Ever-shifting with the rain. Like things from a long-ago dream.. Polybius pings a symbol on a wall, to my right, and I follow. Tracing it around to the crack-toothed mouth of a crude service-tunnel, spewing its mess of fat cables and lost trash. We only found our hidden way in with sensors, radar mapping, old maps, and Polybius. Its just one of a million little holes in this City. Tucked away in the deeps, where nobody will ever find it..... A perfect place to secret away our most prized possession: The Night Tyrant. Our little gift from our Evil Stepmother.. Still in Stealth, I flicker my sensors out. Looking for other ships. Then, I slip us down into that cavernous mouth, and into its carnivorous throat. Silent, hidden, Monolith engine blasting dirt and water clean off the floor as we hover above that coal-black tongue. Building a rage of steam that slithers back through its teeth. The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. Swarm security mode. I mutter, and a laser-sharp circle of red flashes into being around The Tyrant. Burning a virtual ring, into which no living thing may pass. And there I float, on unseen jets of shimmering blue. Guns primed. Sensors locked to the vast dark of the abyss beyond our sight. as massive cogs drip rust and silence from the black above. Blessings from a dead machine-god. My turrets shift. Scopes picking up a Neolithic drone skulking in the corner. Body of dark glass. Eyes of red fire. It stares at me for a moment, then slips away on clicking legs. Too dangerous to be salvaged. Too advanced to be anything new. Its a bad combo. Anything? I hesitate. Detecting movement in bisecting tunnels." Polybius states in the cold void behind me. "The Vile Ones are active. Active.. how? I shiver. They are screaming. It clicks in echo of the things that move outside. Some have torn themselves open. They appear to be filled with- Breeding cycle. I state, with the kind of calm where you aint calm at all. No threat. Yet. Lets slip by... before...." I swallow. "Before they start laughin''..... I manifest in Cyberspace, and raise my arms. Engine control-rings begin to shift - venting upward to overcome buoyancy. The Night Tyrant lurching down onto unfolding wheels, as I drop my arms. Letting the Monoliths spin out in a flash. Cooling gently, in the dark, as the crew unbuckle behind me. Still nothing. I tap a virtual claw on the firing panel. Dammit. Theyre playin with us. I can feel it. I shift my turrets, with a snap, as a wisp of dirt drifts downward. Then slam them upward to target the distant ceiling. Still nothin.. Rrrrrrrrrrrr "Perhaps there really is nothing?" "Maybe." I disengage locks, and my Monolith engines shift outward. Shuddering to a stop. Theres a clunk. A click. And then they fold back into the storage position - first try, even. Now would be a great time to leap us, so I hit drive mode as quick as I can - and our chunky wheels unlock. Virtual controls morphing into something out of a car. We start to roll, and the throat swallows us. The walls thick with cables, spilling up to the distant ceiling. Ruined, scavenged, machines trapped forever in the dark. Like terrible fossils. Like memories of Before.. I slide us in around the rusting, ticking, hulk of a fallen machine. Its purpose unknown, and unknowable. Its gargantuan head still flickering with light. With symbols no living creature understands. On and on we drive. Following a map made of digital markers, into the endless maze of tunnels. Vanishing away from the world.. Who even knows what this place was? Factory? Supply system? Maintenance tunnels? Its all junk now - stripped out by hoodlums, and worse things. Things that slither back into the evil depths on a million freaky little legs. Things from old-world labs, long buried.. .but not dead. We delve half a mile through solid, worming concrete - infested tunnels strung with glittering eyes. Dark things in the dark. Infested robots and people, trailing twisted tendrils as they walk.. Gene-freak nightmares with no names. or faces. but all the mouths and eyeballs you could ever want.. We creep past them all. Vanishing away, into the maze. Eyes on the wall. Hunting out the big peeling Zone One-Fifteen Power Conduit painted on the left. Take the next right after that - and stop when you see the red bucket in the skip. And the rubbish-filled alcove behind it. I lock wheels, and eject my mind from the machine. Collapsing in a disorientated mess of arms that arent engines and legs that arent rear thrusters. But I pull the cable out of my skull - slipping out the door. Ground outside feels thick with grit and oil. With textured lines of paint to break the concrete. The world looming huge, outside the bird. So much bigger than it seemed inside The Tyrant. And..... And I. My legs wobble, and I lurch sideways. The ship''s wall catching me as I almost fall. Lungs heaving. Zip and Kami land with a pat of feet, and a thump of boots. Badger bobbling along behind, one brown hand over mouth, as Demon and Tufty slip down and away. Prowling around the other side of the ship. Theyll be our eyes. I ease myself off the wall, and fumble my SMG out of the footwell. Barrel shivering. But I steel it in careful silence, and we check around the entryway. Guns on every hole and hollow. Moving fast. Not talking. Avoiding sounds that sound like life. Like people. Nothing here. Not much to see. Plain hallway, sized for massive robots. Rails built into the floors, and ceiling. Tiny vents and pipes, leaking strange smells. A hunched wreck of some two-legged thing, its cockpit wrenched open and empty. Stripped to the core. Nothing..... I nod, and we kick the brakes off a massive wheelie bin - rolling it slowly, quietly, gently, outta of the way. The tunnels echoing with every tiny clunk and clatter of its solid plastic wheels. And then we do it again. And again. Four bins in total. I take a quick look round, then clamber back into The Night Tyrant. Rolling us on, in into what used to be a massive delivery area. Now little more than a trash-hoarder''s junk-room. Walls of garbage packed so tight I can barely get half the ship through the door. No way through. Or so it appears. My now-grimy crew slide into the stacks, and the scenery begins to dance around me. Mounds of heavy junk rolling away on flat-bed dollies, trailing skirts of cardboard and plastic to hide their wheels. Walls of old buckets, filled of rotted concrete, rattle as if they weigh almost nothing. As if theyre all packed full of plastic, with rubble glued on top. I edge forward, and Demon works fast to shut the rolling gates behind me. My tail vanishing behind stacks of paint-cans, all dried out inside. Bags of stinking trash. Rotted electronics, stripped totally bare. A busted ladder. And so many sheets and cloths covered in. uh.. best not to speculate. I breach the trash forest. Yellow lines demarcating the robotic Loading Bay beyond. A burnt-out truck hemming me on one side as I swing right across multiple spaces. Its tight, but the walls of trash continue to shift as I swing my nose back toward the exit - reducing its profile. Then I drop out the door, and go help em do the exact opposite of clearing up. Shunting piles of finest, locally-sourced, crap back into position. In eight minutes flat, every wheel is back on every faintly chalked number. And yeah, if you look close youll find em. But if youre looking that close, youre gonna walk smack into The Night Tyrant. We slip back to the ship, to grab our stuff and I drop the emergency charging grapple. Zip hauling out the line to fix its prongs around a massive cable thrumming in the dark. Security on. Stealth on. Breaks on. And done. I shut down the ships faint outer lights, and the whole morass of junk goes utterly dark. Utterly silent. One second. Two. And our cybernetic night-vision flips on. Eyes glowing in the deeps as we hop up onto the concrete loading platform. Tracing mucky footprints along it, then down a hall to the old broken cargo-lifts. Demon wheedles the lattice-gate shut on the specific one we use, and I crank open the busted touchscreen panel. Click the little hidden switch, and snap it shut to use the mic. Spook to Ops, were coming up. Clicking, static - then a robotic, staticy, voice. Password Two. Ah, shit. What was it.? I tap my finger on the mic, like Im thinking. Bluebox? Nah. Kami says, as my claw clicks the pattern. Yeah, close though. Zip smirks, popping his knuckles in a repetitive way. Electric Funbox, mate. Like the band. Nah. I grin. Clattering a nail on the grill. Its Badger smells weird! HEY! The yell echoes back down the hallway, and I clap my hand over the little dweebs gob. Shhhhhh! I hiss as everyone gets their guns up. Stabbing muzzles at the eerie, dust-haunted, hall. Distant clangs stilling, quite suddenly. Leaving us in sucking quiet. The kind where even the words in your head darent whisper.. Shh Nothing. Nothing at all. Or, at least - nothing dumb enough to handily give away its exact intentions with a huge bloodthirsty roar.. I lick my lips, and glance at Zip, who taps out a few nervous beats. He nods. I shrug. And.. Oh, yeah, right. I member it now. I breathe. Password. Is. silence. Permission granted. The creepy voice buzzes, at last, and I flip the switch back. Ignoring the tiny, muted, huff still happening behind me. A second later, the whole lift goes KLUNK and we start to rise. Two seconds. Three. The rail makes a terrifying creak. The rising floor slicing slow inches off our view of that horribly long, empty, hallway. Four seconds. Five. And then. The corridor shrinks to a crack, winking out. We all breathe out. Slowly, everyone relaxes - Zip and Demon leaning on the wall. Kami stretching. Tufty plopping on the floor, with a mewl. Which just leaves- HUMM! I dont smell! Im not smelly!! Whyd you call me smelly?? Badger slaps and storms about - trying to fold his arm round that massive robot hand. Shhhh. Cmon, I was jokin kid. I roll my eyes, and my shoulders. Letting the tiny stomping and huffing drift into the background as the lift shudders upward. Juttering past derelict floors. Broken lights. Dead robots, staring us down. Shifting shadows. And then. .. CRAK.. Metal shutters fold upward, and we drag open the folding gate. Creeping out into a huge basement, scored with jagged yellow-and-black lines. Automated maintenance zone. Or was. A few wild drones, left over from when this was a real place, skitter tiredly into the mess of pipes up one wall. Trundling back into prehistoric tunnels, built before all human records... I make the sign for extra quiet, and Kami slips her boots off. The rest of us going up on tiptoes. Then we slip and duck beneath rattling pipes. Past Zippers scorched testing arena. Dodging past piles of salvage he swears he needs. I shunt aside another trolley fully of crap, and we climb two flights of hidden stairs to the ''ground floor''. Entering a sudden world of soft carpets, strange stains, bullet-holes, and gold trim. Its like an old-timey cinema - all gilt, and gleam, and hasty walls where the windows and doors ought to be. Welcome to The Lobby at the heart of the tower. Guns out, we slip off our kit bags and do a quick sweep. Eerie, silent, little shops trapped in time - pristine, and creepily untouched, behind their sealed metal barriers. We skulk past warring holos for Red Coke and Blue Coke, angrily at odds. Dusty windows hinting at new clothes, half a century out of style, still neatly pressed on their racks. But spattered with blood. Crisp, synthetic, fruits gleam - waxy and perfect - behind plate glass windows. Dust thick on their plastic film. Flickering flashes of light from the virtual arcades, across the hall, gleaming on the half-seen foil of ancient snacks. Still pristine, even after all these years.. Exactly where they were left. We ghost across ruby carpet, soft with dust. Stirring it up into wild eddies that dance in the torchlight - making us cough. An old screen lights the dark with dire warnings of death - streaking yellow bars across the carpet. Evacuation in progress. Genetic freaks. Monsters. Danger. Danger. Get out. Get out while you still can. While youre still alive. We pad a quiet loop around the empty, silent, concourse - and back to the lobby. Checking shuttered stairways, and the three tiny hallways secreted between barricaded shops. Each ending in a heavy, plastic, security shutter blocking off the vast - empty - shopping mall that occupies the entire floor. Two of them are empty things. Silent. As if they simply shut the place down, forever ago..... But one.... One is terrifying. Bullet-torn walls to hem us in. Gore-flecked plaster. Spent grenades. There was a last stand here - corporate police and drones. A desperate fight. A horrible slaughter. I can tell, cause they left dismantled bits of themselves all over the place. Though theres little left, now. Just a few chewed bones. Some ripped armour. Logos. Gnawed bits of plastic. And a huge welded-shut door, plastered with grim skulls and biohazard signs. The GMOs have a quick listen, but its quiet tonight. Maybe whatevers in there is finally dead.? Maybe Shivered and shaken, we retreat to the brass lifts - and gird ourselves. Because this is where things get really dicey. Especially after. that. time. The one we dont talk about. The one where. But we keep our nerve. Rank up - me and Kami, upfront, with our guns out. Demon prowling our ankles. Tufty hunkered behind them, low and scared. Petted by Badger as I nudge Zip to press the button. Which he does - tap, tap, tap, like a code. Two long, then a bunch of short. A camera beeps back, and we all give it the bird. Suitably identified, the machine begins to work. And, nervously, shakily we wait as the red number ticks down. Five. Four. Check your gun. Three. Two. One Ding~ Ding~ > > >< < < >> Interrupted >> Interrupted
## Optical Scan Mode :: [Sequential] ## Building Sensors :: [Integrated] ## Detection Levels :: [Heat], [Sound], [Magnetic], [Radioscopic], ## Threat Analysis :: [Moderate]
Dust swirls in the air. The smell of age, thick and deep. Metal clicks and clacks as the ancient lift crumples open. All our guns jamming through the crack. Right at the greenish smudge of monster blood baked into the back wall. The one riddled with bullet holes. In a single, practised, rush, Demon takes the fore. Claws spread. Eyes wild, golden, and strange. He sweeps forward. Stabbing, suddenly, into the narrow little nooks flanking the door - then hammering down. Cracking claws into the other stains. Then, leaping to twin-slash directly upwards. He drops with a snort, as if disappointed. Leonine tail lashing as he stalks around the lift. Pausing. Sniffing. Flickering at every little movement. Then he stalks his way out, to stand like a sentinel behind us. Then, and only then, do we slide in around him. Rocket-rails charged to sparking as we eye the ceiling - and its welded-shut maintenance panel. The walls. The narrow, dark-filled, maw punched in one side. Jagged. Like something ate its way into the lift. Keep meaning to weld that. I swallow as I fixate on it, and the shadow-void beyond.. Imagining shapes. Movements. Or maybe not even imagining.. Maybe.. Demon paces the lobby. Eying it, ready and alert, for an instant longer than it takes us to fill the lift. Clear. Zha. Clear. No murder monsters- My voice cuts off as sharp ears tune to a distant, rhythmic, thud. Thud. Thud. Fleshy. Messy. Like a corpse banging its head against a wall. Over, and over, and over. We let Demon slip past, then jam our guns out at the lobby. Breath sharp. Fingers twitching at every little noise. At the shiver of something.. felt but not seen. Thump..... Thump..... Louder, every second. The brass buttons of the lift aren''t connected, except to an alarm. So I reach over to flip open the control panel, wires spilling as I fumble my claws slip deep inside it. where the small things scuttle. to a hidden switch. Click. The door, twitches, then rumbles slowly shut as we pull ourselves in. Squashing me into the control corner, and Demon into another. With Tufty and Badger rattling about in the middle. Silence. And a thud. Another. My ears slowly turning to track it, as it shambles ever closer. Stopping, directly, in front of the doors..... Nobody breathes. Nobody. Every eye locked on the door, as.... Tink. Tink. Like a metal fist, rapping very softly on the metal of the door. Tink. Tink. Almost a mimicry of our own tapping, earlier. As if it heard. And then, it stops. The sudden silence so cold and endless.... you could swear you imagined the noises. I don''t dare to move. To look at my team. To twitch an ear, or aim my gun. Not that I can, in the tight space. But..... A sudden clunk, and the the carriage begins to rise with a rattle and a groan. A shiver of floor against skin. A slither of sweat worming down my face, like a moist finger, as the half-imagined things outside go utterly silent. I take a deep breath, and force out as much cheer as I can with it. Safe, now." I lie. "Nearly there...... A few shivery nods from the shorties. Badger perking up, almost instantly, as Zipper makes weird faces to cheer them up. He knows we gotta take your wins, and our laughs, where we can. So I crick out my neck, lean into the corner, and put on a smile as we all relax . very slightly. Operations. Crackles a voice. Password Four. And we go through the same fake act. Damnit. Can''t ever bloody remember these bloody things. I growl to myself - casually rapping on a brass rail, as if in thought. Tap, tap, tap, in careful sequence. And maybe.... maybe that''s what we heard. A claw, or gun, or metal finger knocking against the lift.... Yeah..... Ah, like, cmon mate. Passwords are always just Password. Right? Zip smirks as Kami rolls her eyes. Shaking her head as she raps her boot-heel against the wall in an odd, thumping, pattern. Tap, tap, tap. Pause. Pfff, whatever dummy. She scoffs. Its Shonda. Remember? Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. Dink. Ding. Dink. What? Like, fserious mate? Whats that even mean? He mocks her back, planting hand on hip - and elbow in kitty face. Yeeek- Ah, crap. sorry lil mate- Tufty! I grin, and the kid jumps. Suddenly aware hes second in line for a teasing. Password? Um, gosh. Uh.! Um! I...... Our huddled cat goes rigid, then panics. Glancing at Demon for support. Um.! Um.. I guess. it c-could be.. Horns? M-maybe? Or Tail? Or.... He mumbles off into silence, clutching his own. Zip snorts, blue nail tapping he takes his turn. Nah, lil mate! That was, like, last week! Cmon! He grins, hooking Tuftys shoulders with an arm. Like, yeah! You gotta know this one, right? Reminder: I am instructed to drop this lift into the claymore mines, should the password not be provided. Nyyya! The kitt squeaks as a panicked thrill goes up his back. And mine. I grip the rail tighter. He grips his tail, too. Heh. Better hurry, lil mate. Zip grins as I start tapping faster. Its.. Its. Not about me, is it?? Tuft wilts. Might be. Might be. I try to grin too, and the wilting intensifies. But what''s it gonna be? Oohh! I know!!! Its gotta be AMAZING!!!! Badger whoops. Cause Tuftys AMAZING! Tufty cringes, covers his face, and whips away. Nuuuuu.. Yuh huh! You are! Badger folds his arms, proudly - or tries to. One huge orange mitt waggling dangerously. Tufty is THE BEST! Hes a great, awesome, super-duper-! Wet blanket. Kami butts in, with a smirk. Password accepted. The voice hums, and our green-haired shrimp squeaks. Storming over to bang me on the arm and fume - ears back. Hey! What did I do!? Spookie!! That was really mean!! Y-y-y-ou made calling. calling me that the password!! He humphs loudly, while I chuckle to myself. Hey, dont blame me! I didnt say it! I tease - but he hisses and mewls and huffs. Badger sticking his tongue out in feline solidarity. Heh. We keep the ribbing light as the old lift ponders its way upward. It helps with the shadows. The dark. And the fear of things that slither and squirm about in it.. But our deliberate noise cant block everything - not from GMO senses, sharp as they are. Not from my ears that flicker, this way and that. Focused on the void beyond our little well of light. Beyond the clank and stutter of the lift.. Hungering for whispers of dread. And they are fed. They are fed well. Fed on the ghosts of long-ago screams, still echoing. On the murmurs, and the howls. On the voices of things that dont sound like people.. On the children crying. when there aint no children at all. They say you hear. a lotta funny noises. in old buildings.. Something taps on the roof of the car, and I grip the rail tighter. Like tiny monsters falling down the shaft. .or dirt. Probably dirt. I jump as the box shudders to a stop. Crushing any remaining humour beneath a brick thick wall of sudden, hesitant, silence. Heartbeat. Heartbeat. Little echoes of noise. A biting tap-a-tap-tap. Like someone stuck in a metal box, begging to get out.. or in. Finally, the lift starts to rattle open. Slow. Jerking. Reluctant. Like its lonely as Hell, and afraid of letting go. But Demon grabs it. Holding it still as my SMG slips through the gap.. lips tasting the soft, dusty, dark as it brushes my face with murmurs of musty air. Faint flecks drifting across the narrow strip of dim light. A few yellowed candle-bulbs still glowing on their brassy holders. I tilt my gun, slowly. Ears pricked forward. Tail stilled. Taking in as much as I can. Deepest, reddest, carpets slither and snake - like treacherous serpents, soaked in whispers of dust. Lined, on both sides, by rich, bamboo-painted, wallpaper threaded with bullet-holes.. And randomly broken-in doors. I quiet-breathe through my mouth, scanning the gun back and forth. Lining it up with the faint little holes. Somewhere ahead. something creaks. I lick my lips, and access my implant. Ramping my senses and sensors a little higher. My implant''s own electrical, heat, and bio-magnetic overlays augmented by those of the building itself. Highlighting every monster-spore drifting on the too-still air. As is, I''ve got nothing. Okay. Go slow. I hiss, and Demon begins to guide the door open. Sliding it slowly. One. I hear Tufty swallow. Two.. We all lean forward. Three. Demon and I blur out the door. Into the breathless, skin-thick, dust.. Me up high, tracking with my gun. Him low, bounding on all fours. A few soft, fast, steps carrying me past a massive mirror. Deeply cracked .and speckled with old, dry, blood. Heatbeat. Heartbeat. We stop at the first doorway. Backs to the wall. I tilt my guns camera around the edge, staring at the feed floating in the air before me. White bones glimmer All scattered across the floor. The skull smashed in - horribly, explosively - right near the door. An arm next to it. Fingers broken. as if they were clawing their way out.. Demon turns. Golden eyes sharp. Leonine tail lashing the air as he sniffs, very quietly. Holding his nose to stop the inevitable sneeze. The others slip out to line up behind. Badger clutching his mouth against the dust we kicked. Or his own nerves. Brown eyes jittering, and uncertain. Confused. Almost like hes never been here before. Dots of fluff swirl around us. Kami steps out last. Grimfaced. Boots in one hand - guns in several others. We form up, silently, slipping on our magnetic breathers to fight the powder in the air. Plastic boards squeak weirdly beneath us, and every gun jumps that way. Tufty hunching. Shivering. Tail coiled round his legs.. The hallway so soft, and quiet, and so very still. The bullet-holes like eyes, sprayed across the walls. The paper peeling, slow as time itself. My eyes shift across it all. Quick and precise. Hunting threats, and fools. And even landmarks - like the mirror - that show we got off at the right floor. A door, ahead, barely shifts. A trick of the light? My tail winds a slow, shaken, slither of nervous motion as we ease our way past. Slow as we can. Hunting The Things That Go Bump In The Night.. Some doors lay open. Or half-ajar on their runners, but others are just gone. Or bent, outward, at violent - twisted - angles. Their frames warped and torn by the force of old madness.. When were hidden inside, its all good. It put enemies on their toes. But that trick works on us too. And, worse, are the glimpses we get of flats that look just like our base. Except for all the bones.. Gotta remember: This hallway is ours. These cameras are ours. .even. if it dont feel like it is. We pad onwards. Our minds painting creepy little things that hide in the empty dark of the flats. Dolls with wrong eyes. and maggoty things. And trees full of books.. I can almost see the gaps creep wider. Wider. Wider.. And what if.? I jerk as Tufty presses into my side. Badger with him. Clinging tight. Breathless and scared. And I know even they dont dare make a sound in this terrible, endless, devouring silence. I hold the line, for them. Even if I just want to hit all fours and bolt for it. Just slam round the corner and bang on our door. Screaming to get in. But we round it with careful, ready, and quiet steps. Slipping up to the armoured door of Number Fourteen, on Floor Fourteen. I press the buzzer. I press it again. Tapping a beat. The cameras all focus in on us. And I jab my shaky thumb to the scanner. Then my eye. Kami and Zip swinging guns at shadows. All our sweat cold, as we wait for confirmation. A single dark word, in the crisp - dusty - silence of this forgotten hall, buried deep. Proceed. Click. Clack. Clunk. The door begins to slide.. .and then.. > > >< < < >> Did You Miss Me? >> Did You Miss Me?
## Warning:: [UNKNOWN ERROR] ## Warning:: [UNKNOWN ERROR] ## Warning:: [UNKNOWN ERROR] ## ....
Golden light bursts through the doorway in a shining roar. Ripping away shadow and darkness. Burning the edges of my outline, until.. A whisper. A murmur.. A womans voice, twitching at my ears. Almost singing, almost not. Wordless, tuneless, and gentle as it wraps around me like blankets and fireplaces. And what do I smell? Chocolate melting over hazelnuts, all baked together in a warm sweet dough. I can almost taste the molten fudge and caramel. The soft flesh of her most delicate treats, piping and hot from the oven. I touch my mouth, and shudder. And the light dims away. A table, taller than any Ive ever seen. Wider, and bigger than any Ive ever known. Towering higher than I could climb. But not nearly as tall as the warmly-painted walls, which stretch up and up forever. With brown oak beams, and a dresser by the wall. My eyes drawn to brassy pots and old copper pans. To toys strewn across an old stone floor. And the gentle suggestion of a middle-aged woman, in a worn old apron. Monumental, as the statue of a long-ago god. Yet burnt away to shadow and silhouette by the blazing window behind her. La-de-de.. La-de-doh.. She hums to herself, as the dishes clink. All the stains upon them washed away by that rich aura of warmth. Of kindness. A radiance of glory that blooms from the window, as if it came from her.. I take a little hop on all fours - clumsy, and childish, like I''m suddenly a little kid again. A little pat, on the warm stones that turn that Lovely head. That head so huge and high above me, it seems pressed to the ceiling itself. Her face blotted by shadows as deep as holes. And yet I feel her doting eyes, all crinkling up in Love. Oh! But ~there~ you are, My Little Poppet..! She gushes, from within the light. So loving. So kind. So proud of me, and all I have become. Even though Im only little. With a delicate step as long as a City-block, she turns from the counter. Wreathed in storms of shadow and light, as she leans down to me. Billowing wafts of strawberry perfume and good things from the oven. And there arising from mere shadow and suggestion. .is the most wondrous. .the most glorious. most delicious and sumptuous smile you ever did see. Oh-so kindly, and generous. So full of warm care. Like a childs worn woolly blankie, tucking you in..... Tight. And then tighter still. Wrapping around your- Our Good And Lovely Stepmother brushes back my babyish floof with a too-large hand. Oh, there you are My most Precious Little Poppet! Oh, welcome right home. And wont. won''t you ever come in? She breathes, and its the most wonderful sound there has ever been. Its that perfect scoop of ice-cream sizzling atop a delicious, hot, buttery, cookie taken right from the oven. Just like the one she places on the table. All for me. She lifts me up, and up, and up. Into The Highest High Chair. She drops me into the wobbly seat, so far above the stones. Cooing to me in my panic, and laughing that tinkling laugh, as my toes dangling above a thirty-story drop. My babyish head dragged toward it, as the distance twists into infinity. I dont move. I dont breathe. I don''t dare. Oh how you must have had fun, off playing with all your Little Friends! Our Stepmother sighs, as gently as the beads of melted cream upon my sizzling Treat. In a voice that melts, so slowly..... so very slowly..... in my ears. All skipping off to hide at the Bottom Of The Garden.... But, oh! What a to-do! Mummy didn''t know where you were at all! And Mummy was oh so very ~very~ worried.....! Her hand, so perfect, presses deep to her chest. And I feel her pain, like it''s my very own, as she leans down upon the chair to breathe her breath upon me. A sigh as gentle as a slip of silk.. slithering in through your lips. filling up your mouth. and.... Mummy wept at the window for you to come back..... Oh, for you just to come back..... my poor little Poppets.... But oh! She''s never had such trouble finding any of her Poor Little Dears. Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. Such a sad little shake of her head. She really means it. Really, really. I hurt her feelings when I ran away. I hurt her. I HURT HER. The unforgivable crime. A hot tear scalds my cheek, and she dabs it away with a hankie. Oh! There there! There there, my little Poppet! Come, come, My Dearie! My silly, silly, Little Poppet! Dont you cry! Mummy wont bite! And she baked such a lovely Treat for you, for coming home to Mummy! Don''t you even want to try it....? And I do. I really do. My little nose drawn in by the scent of butterscotch cream. And Fudge. And Chocolate. My little clawed hands reaching out for it, as she grips my elbows with motherly fingers. Pushing me to crawl right out of the terrible High Chair. Mind screaming as I pull myself up, and crawl over its little eating-tray, and onto the table. Crying out as the whole thing crashes to the ground behind me. But something in my heart has eyes only for that hot, fresh, cookie draped in half-frozen cream. A motherly hand on my back, as the radiant titan reaches out my hands for the plate. I want you to try all my latest recipes, you know!" Whispers that haunting, drifting, slithering voice of Sadness and Love. "Ive been working so very hard to get better..... so you wont. Run Away From Home again.. and. OH! ..I dont know what I did to make you hate me so.! Didnt you like all My Presents and Toys? Mummy worked so ~very~ hard to make them for you, too." "Don''t. Worry. Mummy." I say, as she moves my mouth. "I. Won''t. Ever. Run. Away Again!" My pudgy baby hands are dragged to the spoon. A nearly-whimper held back in my throat. "Not. Ever. Or. Ever. Or. Ever....." I have to..... I can''t.... My hand touches the spoon, and suddenly it''s free. I''m free. And, in a single practice motion, I rip the SMG from my back. Twisting upward, and upward, towards the gargantuan face of the- But when I pull the trigger, its nothing but a cheap toy gun that wizzes and lights up. Red, and plasticy. Like the one I had when we were five.. Oh! Bang! You got me! Mother clutches her heart, and tinkles with joy. You are such a good shot, My Best Little Poppet! I always did say! What the H- Something sharp as blood-soaked knives presses in around me, like a skinsuit of knives. And I slam my fangs shut on the swearword, just in time. Its instinct. I dont even dare. There are Things You Dont Do around. Mummy.. But I manage to force out some words that arent just baby noises. How are you here!? We- Shhhh. Our Evil Stepmother breathes, and - just like that - Im sitting back in the chair. And there is her perfect, pleasurable, hand rubbing my back. So soothing. So insidious. Oh Poppet. Oh Poppet. You know youll hurt Mummys feelings if you dont try her Lovely baking that she spent hours and hours and hours on. I stare down at The Treat. The Perfect, beautiful, Treat. My mouth watering at the very thought of it..... ...as something cold and nasty sticks in my throat. "But it does look so very, very delicious." Mummy breathes. "I really really should." "Yes. I. Really. Really. Should. Or. Mummy. Will. Be. So. So. Frowny. And. Sad." My mouth is made to say. Oh go on, then, Sweetie! Its all for you! And it''s not like Id do anything Naughty to it!" That laugh drizzles in my ears, like chocolate melting onto the desert. "Oh, that would be very Silly now.. wouldnt it.? And I feel the expectation. The whisper of her want: For me to Do As I''m told. For me to Please Mummy. And. My little hand lifts up the spoon that''s suddenly in it, just as the Treat slides itself along the table. Drawing out a sound - like a long, low, growl. It stop, right before me. Staring up at me. Like the threat of something nice. And my hand shudders as it turns the spoon sideways. Slicing, down, through molten cream and fudge. Sticky, and cold, and molten, and hot. I lift it, shaking. Sizzling cookie-dough melting together with icy caramel chocolate on my tongue. Hot and cold. Thickly creamy, and oh-so frozen. But all of it Sweet. So very, very, very, very Sweet. Like her. Mothers smile is radiance itself. It makes you want to smile right back, with desert all round your mouth. Just so she can dab it away. Wonderful! I hope youll tell me what you think! Oooh! I cant hardly wait!!! Thank. You. Mother. I say on pure, robotic, reflex. Its. Very. Very. Scrummy. Mother." Something warm dribbles down my lip. "I. Could. Eat. It. Forever. And. Ever. And. Ever." I swallow, hard. "Mother. Her hands clutch tight. Her voice swells. Her whole body glowing with golden Love, and Happiness. Oh! My Sweetie! Thats all Mummy ever wanted to hear! She sighs, and melts, as my hand forces me to take another huge - indulgent - bite. And it really is the very best thing I have ever, ever tasted. It heats and cools and burns and freezes its way all down my throat. like magic and molten toffee. I take another bite. Another. Until. .its. .all. .Eaten Up. Oh! Im so glad you like it, my Special Poppet! She wipes away a tear. And now its all inside you! Tucked in snug, and tight, like a little Secret! And you can keep it Forever And Ever.. Her hand touches her lips. Her smiling lips. Her Lovely, warm, moist, perfect lips. Oh! But do look at the time!I think a Special Poppet needs to go and play with their friends..! For...ever. Oh yes.. Our Good Stepmother delicately wipes away her tears, though I dont see even one. But now.. The smile is wider, like a cuddly toy with a cartoony grin. Now. Now. Now.. I know you Wont Mind if Mummy comes to see you.. every so often! Come see.. But you cant. We. We hid. We ran away, where you.... can''t.... ever.... find.... us..... I stare at the spoon. I stare at the plate. The empty plate. I clutch at my mouth, and I feel sick. No. No. NO! You- A huge, warm, finger presses to my nose. Freezing it with chills and cold. Dont worry. My Sweet. My Poppet. My Little Treat.. The Smile.. You may have all Flown The Nest, but. Mummy Has Her Little Ways to find her Little Dears, you know.! And you cant all Hide Behind The Curtains! Not at all! A gentle dab at the tear in her eye, and then at the cream around my mouth. The cream that cracks like tar. Like concrete. And, you know.. we do have so ~very~ much to talk about. So very much! And I really do hope. Flecks of cream tinkle on the table, like blackened glass. I really ~do~ hope.. that one day.. One day.. you will all come home.. Her breath on my cheeks. Warm as sweet fudge, and cold as ice. That youll tell Mummy what she did to make you hate her so. The fingers tighten on my cheeks. .so. Tighter and tighter. .so, very, very much. And, just like that, shes gone. Leaving me choking. Gasping. Huddled on the hallway floor.. > > >< < < >> Mindvoid >> Mindvoid The red hallway lurches as I tumble back from the now-inky door. Details twisting as I crash into the wall behind me. Oh God. Oh God. It was her. It was her. It was. Spook!? Tufty gasps. But I barely hear him. I''m choking. Choking on. something. something .....I ate..... I can still taste. My knees hit the deep, dark, red of the carpet. My fingers grip it - tearing with claws. I stare into it, as if it has answers. Then, up at the doorway. But nothing. Just a cupboard-sized space, leading to a slab of an internal security door.. Spook? Kami hesitates, a flash of rare concern in her hard eyes. What the Hell, Spook? She recovers. You trying to scare us? Spook. Are you still functional? Crackles the turret above the door. I rub my face, shaking quietly as I paw my way up the wall. Hhh-? Spook..? Nyaaa? Mate? Hey, like- Zip hisses as I stagger away from our home. Mate, hey! Hey! Like, c''mon! Hostile area! We gotta get in- Mind broken, I lunge away from them. Down the hall. Diving into a spore-filled flat and hitting the panel to lock myself in. Not even caring. Whatever geneFreaks and monsters are in here. ..its nothing.... .....nothing compared to. Spook." States another turret. "You are not thinking clearly. This is a dangerous envi- Her! It was her! I choke. Planting my hands on a countertop soaked in dust. She was freakin HERE! I am not sure I understand. The machine states, swinging the barrel to cover me. HER. I hiss into the sound-proof dark. Our EVIL STEPMOTHER. She was here.. Bone clinks against toe-claws, and I stagger back. Little white lumps rolling across stiff, spiky, carpet. What..? My eyes widen. Heartbeat roaring, as Common Sense comes slamming back into the room. Smacking me around the face, and kicking over tables. Oh.. Shit. My back hammers into the door. Gun into my hand. Spook- Scan the footage. Everything. Do it. I take a long breath, and hit the emergency release. Nobody else can know. Understood. The door behind me clunks open, and I step back out. Dust shifting in the low light. Spookie? Tuft stutters as Badger launches himself into my side. Forcing me to jerk, and stiffen. Nothin. It was nothin. Cmon. I growl. Fending off the little weirdo, harder than I meant to. He falls on his ass, and stares at me. Pain stabbing my guts. But I flick a shaken hand, and they snap into position around me. Guns up, and ready, as things begin to click and hiss in the dark.. Rippling noises that eat at the edges of your sanity. I motion forward - and Zip, Badger, and Kami step into the secure entryway. The outer door shutting with a crisp snap. A second later, it opens again and Demon has to drag me inside with Tufty. Deathly flickers of sickness and cold twisting at my writing insides. I shut my eyes. I dont want to meet her again. But I dont wanna get left in the dark, either. All lost and alone and. Pressure hisses as the outer door seals tight. A robotic arm drops to eye-level, and Im scanned by a low pulsing light. One second. Two. Then the inner door unseals, I tumble out - into the dim-lit den of our livingroom. A wrought iron staircase, swooping up to the balcony above. And, beneath it, our big cozy Sofa Nook. A toilet and and open-sided kitchen on the left. Twin bedrooms on the right. And empty crisp packets, cans, and wrappers layered thick across absolutely everything. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. Ive never felt so damned happy to see it. Its not..... Im not- I yelp as Demon snags my arm. Kami grabbing the other with three of her own. Zipper leading as they pull me aside - with Badger hopping about behind, and Tufty peering over the sofa. Pricking his fuzzy ears at me. I fake a laugh. Yknow. We aint really outta earshot if everyone joins in. Not that youre ever gonna be outta Tuftys- Spook, are. are you okay? Kami says in an oddly gentle voice. It sounds weird. Yeah, yeah, Im- Demons eyes burn my face. Scanning, quietly. Hrmmm. He grunts. Zis. Strange-acting. is unsettling to me. Too right, mate. What happened? I hesitate, ignoring a flailing Badger. Yeah. Well, dont tell everyone. But my.. implant glitched. Glitched? Kamis folds her arms, with a dull clang. Yeah. Glitched. I state. Ending it there. So. What.? What happened? She gestures to me. Prompting. Weird lights? Went blind? Massive feedback? Pain? Holy Hell. I cant tell. If they thought. Theyd freak out so hard.. I glance away. Rubbing my neck. Look. I dunno. Pols gonna screw with it n see. But, for now. Even to me, it sounds like I''m hiding things. They share a weird look. Spook..... uh. Its fine. I flick a hand away. Trying for confident. Itll be fine. Just dont. Uh, dont. I trail off beneath their multiple, confused, stares. I told you. Pols handling it. Let it drop. Mate- But Kami cuts Zipper off. Okay. Spook. She says, with a very level look. Raising a metal-filled eyebrow at him. Better go clear up - youve got a lot of blood round your mouth. You bite your lip or something? My guts compact to the size of a marble. What. Go look in the mirror. Is all she says. Stalking off, into the kitchen, to glare at her breakfast. Or something. Dragging Zipper along with her, presumably to help. I swallow. Demon blinks at me for a second, then follows. Badgers head on a swivel as he tries to work out what happened. But I can''t answer that, and I bolt in the cluttered bathroom. Slipping on plasticy wrappers as I slam the door. Eyes shut, against the mirror, as I grope for the rim of the sink. Claws clink on ceramic, and I plunge them under the tap. Splashing water over my face. Scrubbing hard. Not looking. Then I let out a breath, and open my eyes. Staring at the dripping-wet Spook in the mirror. No blood, as if it was never there. Ears twitching as huddled voices whisper through it from the kitchen. What the Hell happened out there.. Kami hisses. "Did Spook''s implant really glitch?" Mate, like, I dunno." A verbal shrug. "Like, I said we ought to upgrade- "Can''t afford it." Zpook, is. .just ran off, toward the.. Mate. No. You- We need- I flip open a vScreen in mid-air, and ramp my hearing down to human levels. Head low. Breathing hard. Maybe.. Maybe theyre right. Maybe I just.. bit my damn lip. Or something. Yeah. Thats rational right? I just had some. I dunno what. Flashback? ..and. bit my lip. And then. ..it magically healed. I put a hand on the mirror, pressing hard. Like Im trying to break it. And maybe I am. Maybe I want to break it, so theres actual blood in here. So I cant just. I flip open the hallway feed. Dialling it back. Seeing the team slip up to the door, stacking like were about to breach. It opens. And I.. I just .panic at nothing. Stumble back. Bolt on all fours. No Evil Stepmother no...... A flicker. Frowning, I spin the footage back again. And again. Staring hard at the feed.... My arm. It moved. Like it teleported. One second, here. The next second there. I spin it back again. Again. Bringing up the timestamp, as Polybius unfolds into existence behind me. As if the air itself is Polybius, and..... Theres a jump. I whisper. A jump in the feed. Eight minutes. Thirty-two point five-three seconds. The machine agrees. Where did it go? Silence. Pol. Where did the bloody time go? Unknown. I bring up my eye-camera feed, and there. Right there. A flicker of darkness, where there should be light.. Eight. freakin. minutes. I breathe. Something.. something happened in that hallway. I stare at Polybius. And a sudden, dark, thought spins through my mind: Theres a Traitor. In the group. Find. I breathe, claws tight to the sink. The plinth cold on my tail, as I shake. As I hiss. As I choke. Find...... out..... Where. That. Freakin. Time. Went. NOW." Polybius maintains its cold vigil as I grip the sink, and shiver. Like something sick and cold is worming its way through me. I still feel it. I feel the thing inside me. And yet, I''m, still hungry. Like she cut open my belly as she fed me, and I got nothing at all from the ''meal''..... And maybe it was just imaginary. Maybe..... My eyes close again. My breathing stills. And then I straighten. I put on a big stupid smile. And step out. Fending off a bouncing, flailing, question-filled Badger.. mostly by knocking him upside the head with a loose cushion. He goes over like a lamp, and I toss in some balls to make Tufty pounce. Which makes Badger pounce. Which devolves into the lil squirts chasing each-other round our big ole huddle of busted sofas. Slipping on sweet-wrappers as they charge all over the place. Do I tell them? Can I. I breath in hard, and make a decision. But when I face off against the crowd in the kitchen, its just Zipper. Blue hair tickling opal tiles as he leans hard on the bartop counter, facing out into the livingroom. Facing me, as it happens. > > >< < < >> Gremlins In The Attic >> Gremlins In The Attic Zipper''s eyes meet mine, and a mad surge of emotion rips through me. Dozens of thoughts vying to escape me in in a mad explosion of garbled words. They were talking about me behind my back. They were conspiring. ''Picking Quarrels'', as The School would put it. And that''s a good way to end up in very, very, very literal hot water. If you''re lucky. But even as my hands slam down on the tiled surface of the kitchen''s bar, I snap my teeth shut on the urge to expel all my nerves at Zipper in a crazed rush. He don''t deserve it. It''s not his fault. And he clearly doesn''t want to be here. So, instead, as he recoils and raises his guard.... I force myself to breathe out. Then to twist something onto my face that could, in the dim light, be called a smile. Picked the short straw, huh? The boy''s, eyebrows flicker with strands of metallic silver as they rise. Well.... Kinda." He admits. "Kami...." "Yelled at ya, and stormed out?" "Heh. Basically, yeah." He rubs at his neck, and shrugs. "She said.... well, like, that someone had to talk to you, like. And that it wasn''t gonna be her. Y''know? And that she ''sucks at all this cheery chatty bollocks'' and.. uh.... yeah..... I blink. "She.... actually said.... she sucks??" His eyes flick up and away. "Well.... I mean.... she sounded pretty pissed at me when she said it. Like it was my fault, or whatever." His lip twitches. "She, uh, sorta kinda also said she''d ''hoist me on my own intestines'' if I told you.... though..... Uh...." "Huh. Wonder why." I snort. "Maybe I should ask....." "Yeaaaah- Uh.... Maybe not, mate..... Like-" "Coward." I snort, slumping a little. "Look. Zip-" "Mate..... Like, about....." I flash a hand. "Look, I know you got a ''mission'' to ''fix'' me here. But Kami ain''t the boss. I am." Deep breath. "And I know shouldn''t have bloody run off. It was stupid. It was crazy. I''m sorry. And I won''t do it again. Alright? So lets.... put a pin in the ''pep talk''. Okay?" Zip''s gloom sparks into cheerful relief. "Right, mate! But, like.... can you sorta tell Kami I did?" "Sure." I snort. "I''ll tell her ya scooped me up a whole buncha pre-cooked bollocks about, uh, friendship and teamwork and crap?" "Heh. Sounds about right, mate!" He smirks, flicking me a double peace sign. "But y''know, like, for reals.... if you ever wanna tell me what happened.....?" He stutters into silence as my claws grind in the gaps between the tiles. Our eyes meet. His lit with concern. And mine..... I rip them away. Words boiling in my throat, like poison - clawing at my tongue. Eager to spill from me. But..... if I told them what I saw...... The crew would either damn me as insane, and dethrone me as leader.... or worse..... ...they would believe me. Either one could rip us apart. Either one could plunge us back into our past. Into the mad, twisted, brutalistic paranoia of The School.... where truth is a lie, and lies are everything. And Opposite Day is a lethal reality. That''s why the traitor terrifies us so much. Not just because it might be real, but because it might be imagined. Because The School''s insanity infected us, right down to our bones. And the dark terror of it pumps through our veins like blood. Twisting our nightmares. If I start spitting mad stories of visions and missing time, they''re gonna lose their Goddamned minds. They''ll panic. Not just because I''m ''losing it'', but because that place fed on us for so long we became a part of it. And it of us. A shadow on our hearts, ready and eager to come creeping out of the dark. To infect our sanctuary, and our world, like some kind of cancer in the stuff of reality. Endlessly spreading. So. Best guess is they''ll leap on the most solid explanation available: That ''Spook is nuts and unreliable.'' That everything I saw is a wild, vivid, ''PTSD flashback''. And that I''m fixated on a ''glitching, stuttering, old camera'' that probably jerks and jumps all day long. And that''s why I just.... can''t tell them. Zip would be terrified, even if he didn''t believe me. They all would be. And each and every bloody one of them will fight the idea that The School Has Found Us, almost to the point of death itself. Because The Monster In The Kitchen cannot be allowed to touch us again. So they''ll rationalise it. They''ll say it''s impossible. That the monsters are trapped and tucked away, literally a thousand miles from us. Locked away in their own private reality, like nightmares and dreams split from the waking world. And they''ll chant that phrase that has kept us going ever since we got out: ''The School has no idea where we are.'' Which is, even now, evolving into ''They''ve stopped looking for us.'' And other lies. Even the sudden reappearance of Moon can''t shake that kind of thinking. They''re already starting to explain that away, too: A fake. A local scam. An elaborate trick that can''t really hurt us. And Wayman Company will be next, no matter how much sense that doesn''t make. Because this ain''t about truth. It''s about survival. And sanity. And protecting our minds from what happened Before. Because if they''re HERE.... ....actually, physically, verifiably, HERE..... then maybe.... ....just maybe..... ....The School''s twisted, psycho, ever-changing, reality is the Real one..... Zip frowns at me, quiely. Waiting. Waiting. Until he can''t take it anymore. "But, like, seriously mate..... Do you wanna talk-?" "God, I''m bloody hungry." I growl. Leaping fully onto the counter, and pretending to snuffle the air in the kitchen. Damnit. Any food left? "Maybe, mate. But....." "Hey, let''s just sort breakfast. Alright?" I yawn, hugely. "Anythin'' left in the cupbards? I know we had a stash up in there someplace....." "I guess mate. Dunno if it survived this long, though." "Ah come on. We-" "MATE!" Zip yelps and ducks as a certain ''war-paint''-streaked dork lets out massive battle-cry behind us. My eyes snapping around as he leaps, madly, off the top of a sofa. Bringing a ''beanbag-chair battle-axe'' swinging down to cleave a terrified Tufty in half. There''s an instant of realised horror on cat-boy''s face, and then the century-old fabric engulfs his head - rupturing in an explosive tsunami of squashy little beads. Billions of the damn things, blasting in every direction. Roaring over the lip of the counter like the blast-wave of a nuke. I yelp, and roll to escape it. Landing in the kitchen, on all fours, in a single fluid motion. Mounds of white, white, ''snow'' whispering down around us. Clinging the walls, the ceiling, cupboards, and tiles. To my tail, my arms, my ears, my skin. And everything else in sight. Zipper, his hair covered in tiny baubles, stares at me and snorts loudly. Fighting to keep it in, until it''s just too much. "Oh, man, like....! You....! You look like a little kid''s Christmas card, mate! Your face! Like, it''s all over-" "Murder." I breathe, in the voice of death. "Murder." "Uh, mate-" "MURDER!" "Yeha, huh. Maybe you get.... get, like cleaned off and I''ll go deal with-" "Murrrrder...." I agree as he makes a bolt for it. Leaving me to slap and flail at myself to knock the stuff off even as it keeps on coming. Scratching, furiously, with a foot. Shaking and flapping until off what I can. Though the dang stuff is all up in my mouth, my nose, and everything. It''s just too much. And so, resigning myself to my new life as a partial snow-monster, I set about finding breakfast. Prowling my way around the horrid old fridge (now mummified with duct tape, and plastered with dire warnings) as I sneak up on the lower cupboards. Bracing myself for a good ole poke-about. And I do mean brace. Because yknow what happens when you leave a bunch of open food in a kitchen for five times longer than Ive been alive? Nothing wholly holy, wholesome, or sanitary. Thats what. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it "Hey. You, like, really think there''s anything in there?" Zip yells through from the wreck-room, dangling a smaller yeti in one hand. "We''ll see." I growl, horribly. Cracking one of their doors to peer inside - from wherein, mounds of dark mould and gunk stare back at me. With big eyes. And grin. I shut that one, sloooowly, and seal it with tape and wire. Then I try the next one over, which merely smells like people died in it. A condition that, unfortunately, that makes it an ideal candidate for our ever-mobile secret snack stash. After all - what''s better than a nasty stink to fend off those sneaky lil GMO noses? I mean, besides a landmine. "Any good, mate?" Zip yells as Badger wiggles free, cackling with mad energy. Not yet. But, daaamn.... it''s bloody grim in here.... I wince, tossing out a suspiciously sloshy old thermos. "Wait. I think I see..... Wow. Is that.... an ancient sandwich!? I hold up the sealed pack, admiring the livid black and green spots. Mmmm. Tasty. I grin. Yknow, some forms of mould aint poisonous.. "Oh, gross mate! You first! Zip yelps. Ducking back into the kitchen as a very snowy Demon storms past in pursuit of a giggling idiot. With a terrified Tufty clinging to his horns, no less. "Heh." I flip him a fangy grin. Ythink it got left here by the previous owners, or am I lookin at whats left of the previous owners? Yuck. Either way, mate. Oh, yahh! Gross!" We both yelp as the sealed package starts to squirm in my fingers. Yeah, nope. Nope! No thanks!" I agree, diving for the biohazard crate on the counter to stuff the horrendous thing inside. Fending off escaping condiments, and ramming em back in their pit. Damn,, like. wow. You ever gonna empty that? He breathes as I lean hard on the rattling lid. Hm? Empty? Incinerate? One of the two. I grumble, furiously duct-taping things down. "Right. That oughta hold it.... for now.... But damn am I hungry, here.... I''m hollowing out. Full famine mode....." I drop back on all fours. Tail whisking as I sniff the air. "Rrr. That won''t work." I dive back into the cupboards - prying open door after disturbingly sticky door. Hurling out random items, all over the place. A can of SUPER Spray-on Corn Plasters!. An old phone. A rattling jar of dusty old cred-chips..... All refugees from a bygone age, when digital money blasted through the air all over The City. And..... I rip open one of the upper cupboards and - with absolutely no warning - something small, scaly, and viciously spiky slams directly into my face. Latching on with its viciously sharp little claws. A ruby tail swinging as I scream, twist, and fall. Which would''ve been way less of an issue, if I hadn''t been stood on the counter at that exact moment. There''s a bang. A hideous wail (me). And I topple onto my face - holding part of a cupboard. This, at least, knocks off the tiny monster - who bounces off five other cabinets squealing Spookieeeessss!!!! SssssssSSSPOOKIEssss!! at ear-shattering volume. Bounding off Zipper, the ruined furniture, and me as I try to get up. Spoookies!! Yous camesss backssss! Youss camesss backsss!!! "Rrghghggh....." I groan, fending off some playful swipes. "And then there were bloody three of em." "Spoookies!!!" The tiny red blur chips again, bounding in circles that send her leaping over her own too-long tail. Ssspoookiess Spoookieesss Spoookiess! "Yes." I moan, tossing the ruined door to one side. "What''s bloody left o'' me, anyways." "Uh, mate? You okay?" Zip winces, leaning over the crimson monster in the hope of helping me up - but I fend him off. "Fine. Fine. I had way too much face, anyway." I growl, rubbing at what''s left of it. "God damn. Who let her out of containment." "Dunno, mate. Want me to, like..... go get....? Y''know....? Mr Shooty-Sleep-Sleep?" He mimes pulling a trigger, with a wink. Gremlin''s lil head tilting in confusion. I flick him a look. "Nah, we''re runnin'' out. But I''m kinda partial to Dr Netty-Pew-Pew." I add, as the small scaly wotsit bounds up - onto the ceiling - and sticks there. Perring down at us with big, curious, eyes. "Plus, last time, ya hit Badger on accident." "Ah. Yeah, mate." He says, as nearby sounds of destruction intensify. "Like, total accident." "Could always try the ''diplomatic'' approach?" I add, as the red blur scampers in happy little sticky-pawed circles around the ceiling. Batting at the lightbulb and snapping at the tuft on her whipcord tail. "Good idea mate, but, uh - I think we''re out of napalm." "Pity." I mutter. "Right. Nothin'' for it then." I take a breath. "OI! Scaly! Get ya ass down here!" "SpppOOOkiesss!! Spookiesss!!! Come play-play!!!" She trills, bouncing down onto the cabinet top. Flickering long and adorable ears, as she pulls into a long - feline - stretch in her adorable ''little monster'' pyjamas. Ruby scales of dark and bloody red glimmering on squishable lil kitty cheeks, topped by hair like dried blood. With hugely round, dark, eyes that scream ''adorable lil demon-tyke'' from half a mile away. Which is about the minimum safe distance, as a matter of fact. The scaly thing curls a mischievous little yawn, full of mischievous little fangs, and purrs at me happily. Inviting me closer, as she scratches a long pointy ear with an oversized hind-paw. and fires herself directly at my face. I duck, and she squeals happily - already in full play mode. I.e., claws out and ready to mince. You cant bloody fool me twice, titch.....! Hey, wheres the PJs from? Did Demon print ya those? I add. "DeeemonsSSSssesss?" "Y''know? Blond hair? Horns?" Ooooh!! Yessss Yes-essss!!" She nods, very hissy and pleased with herself. "Yellow thingsss superssss nicess!!!! Brushesss meesss hairs!!! And tellsss meesss storiesssss!!!" "Wow, that''s-" "Andss sssupersss tastiesss!!!!" She smacks her lips. "Andss screamssss bigss-BIGSss whenss meess bitess his- Ahahah. Yeah. I bet he does. I laugh, very nervously, as Zip extracts the ''Gremlin petting stick'' and rubs the top of her head. Which results in some horrible cracking noises, and a much shorter stick. "Good grief. He''s taking his bloody life in his hands doing that....." My eyes narrow. So, hey. Gremie.... you seen our snacks round here? "Ssssnacksssesss?" She hisses, head tilted adorably. "Oooh! Yellow thingssss?" "Ahah. No. Not him." Her head tilts the other way. "Blue thingsssss?" She licks cute lil scaly kitty lips at Zipper. "I mean the actual snacks! Not us! The ones you''re allowed to eat!" "But meeess allowdssss chompsss!!!" She tantrum-flops. "I mean the bags of food! The bags! In the box! In the cupboard!" Oooh, yesssesss!!! Themsss tastiesss toooss!!! Gremlin perks happily - very pleased with herself. Ah Crap..... Not again..... The whole box!?" "Yumsss yumsss!!!" "You scaly lil bin!" I facepaw. "Guess theres nothing bloody for it. Zip trades me a wink. I guess we gotta eat HER! EEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!! Gremlin squeals happily. Diving over the edge of the counter before ironic, toothy, vengeance can be meted out. She hops up on a wall, looks back - and I take a big dramatic step, sending her scampering into the fray with Badger. Which.... uh.... .....quickly devolves. Heh. Well, that''s her sorted..... But whatre we gonna eat? I sigh as Zip has a last, dubious, shufti in another cupboard. Finding only a few scraps of wrapper and a terrified, half-chewed, tentacle abomination that clings to his hand for safety. "Ah dunno mate." He grunts, flicking it off into a new hazmat box. "I mean, like - (No, let go! Let go!) - I know you really hate the idea. But, like, we could bodge off downstairs and crack open.. He winces, seeing my expression. .those shops? "Yeee. I dunno. Y''really wanna scarf down a freaky truckload of food that''s ten times older than us?" I shudder. "I mean, come on, this aint the internet. We got standards in here. We ain'' gonna lick a buncha petrified Crystal Stardust Bars just cause I can. I have a snicker. Though itd be pretty funny to see if Grems stomach can handle that crap. Zip snorts, slapping the table. Mate. Like, she ate the food box! Im pretty sure, like, shitty old food aint gonna stop her. Yknow? Weirdest ''Girl Power'' slogan I''ve ever heard. Kami snarks, leaning her too-many hands on the sideboard. "We doing this or what? Only I just caught Gremlin eating our bloody underwear again." I slap my poor, abused, face. "Dirty or clean?" She cringes, horribly. "Do you REALLY want the answer to that?" "No. No, I do not." I groan as my belly rumbles furiously. "RRRRRrrrrh. I wonder what roast Gremlin tastes like." "Probably the sofa." Kami snorts. "She eats enough of it." Heh. Yeah. But, seriously, like..... what we gonna do for, like, food and stuff? Zip says, groping about in some cupboard I already checked. I mean, like.... if there ain''t anything here then that only leaves- NO! Not the army rations! Not again! I panic. .but, mate - its, like, the only thing left. Yknow?" He drops his arms in frustration. "Like.... there''s no snacks left, and- Kami smirks. The sofa? I consider it seriously. "If it''s that or canned cheeseburger...." "Look. We''ve got nothing." Kami states, almost happy about the idea. "And we''re ducking training. So lets just-" "Woah. No. No chance." I growl. "It''s food or death, over here." "But mate, like, we don''t got any food!" "There''s.... one other option." I breathe. "And it ain''t whoever Gremlin is eating." "Sounds like Demon, mate." "Noted." I growl, over the screams. "But this is gettin'' desperate. I got a whole hungry crew to feed here, and we got nothin'' but scraps and air. It''s time to get drastic. It''s time..... to go get some food." "Mate, you aren''t thinking what I-" "Oh yes." I grin. "Kami. Get me my ''shopping crowbar''. We''re gonna go get.... ''takeout''....." >>><<< >> Operation: Gingerbread Jungle >> Operation: Gingerbread Jungle
## Activating :: [Virtual Ops Systems] ## Loading Blueprint :: [Spook''s Big Dumb Tower Thing] ## Visualising :: [Level Zero Shopping Complex] ## .....
Dim golden lights gleam on ancient snacks, from before the dawn of me. Crisps older than your dad. Munchies dustier than your mum. And finest chocolates from back when your grans gran was a girl.... All hermetically sealed behind reinforced plastic shutters, brick walls, and tick doors. Seemingly perfect, at least from out here.. I weigh my implement. Speculatively. Front shutters are a bad idea. To loud. Too exposed. I whisper into the listening silence. Kami nods. Probably get stuck halfway. Doubt wed get em sealed up again. Zip winces. Damn, like.. getting some real hardcore horror movie vibes from this one, mate. I nod. Stupid teens leave big door open. Catboy gets eaten by hairy horrors. Nobody notices. Tufty gulps. I like this plan already. Kami smiles, softly. Tufty gulps harder. I shake my head. Map: Highlight all entrances to target. The building blueprints leap into being. Zeroing in on the area marked Lobby. A tiny island of semi-safety, right at the core of the tower. Deeply ensnared within the seductive coils of a dead mall - yet sealed from it. Secreting us away within a little loop of shops and kiosks, arrayed around a central hub. Its edges turn red, and the doors flash yellow. Vents picked out in green. There. Right there. I pivot to the others. Kami. Reception desk. Got a maintenance door. She says, drifting through it like a ghost. Looks like a back-way in. I snort. Bad luck, monsters: no catboy on toast. Tufty looks relieved. I flick a claw, and the simulation ends in an implosion of light and shadow - sucking itself back into our map. I snap it closed, and the lift rolls open. Demon plunges out - flanked by Zip and me, with SMGs - as we slip back into the dust and darkness of the lobby. Tufty huddled in the middle. Kami backing out behind us, pistols in hands, to hold our rear. The whole group wired, primed, locked, loaded, and ready to rock as we adventure out into the forgotten darkness. dust-soft carpet beneath us. Nothing moves in the drifting silence. Nothing at all. Silence thick, and shivered with expectation, drills into our souls as we spread from huddle to full tactical sweep. Ancient gift-shops blurring past. Our faces cast in vicious yellow and bloody red by the endless, slithering, ribbons of holo-light that scrolls along both walls. Eerily quiet. Flickering and fluttering. A train of arrows pointing the eternal evacuation, on and on..... toward false salvation. We follow them, almost subconsciously. Even as they flicker, and die. Resurging, then dying again. Brass rails glimmer with foggy adverts for products long-gone - blurred to fuzzy colour by a century of dust. We pass a shop twisted tight with fake flowers - a broken robot selling tatty gifts. Past cold shutters. And toilets. To the wide, brassy, gleam of the lobby itself - still frozen in time. And scattered by bullet-holes. The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Every evacuation arrow pointed toward the glorious main exit, directly opposite the front desk. A wide, welcoming passage into darkness.... terminating in a bricked-up wall, backed by security shutters. The arm of a robot worker crushed beneath its weight. No way out. We stand there, for a breathless moment, as whispers of dust drift down and ever down. Coating screens. Caking holo-lenses. Softening the carpet, and piling on the rails. I flick a claw, and Demon hops onto the wide - curved - reception desk. Trailing soft toe-prints in the dust as he drops, in a flash of claws. Hunting beneath it. I nudge Tufty too, but he screws up his face and shakes his head rapidly. Shivering horribly. So we all leap the slippery desk - forcing him to follow, or be left alone in the dark. We drop by the door. Kami crouching on her toes, lips working furiously as Zip rips tools from his armour. Threading in tiny probes as she runs a handheld scan to isolate the boobytraps, tricks, and - most dangerous of all - wailing alarms. But its old. Original. A known design. The thick locks snap open, and we slide our way into the automated stock-room. Kami slapping a tiny, covert, camera onto the outside of the door as Zip peels microdot alarm-sensors off a sheet. Pressing them into the frame. Then we shut it, sealing ourselves inside. Guns drift across a tiny room built from massive hermetic cubes of pale, tinted, blue glass. Shimmering, and creepily free of the dust outside. I flick at the panel by the door, and Zip rips a cable from his gear. Stabbing one end into his implant to plug his brain directly into the system. His face twitches, shivers, but his eyes remain open. Aware. Alert. As the huge hematic cargo-boxes begin to shut. Some down. Some up. Some left or right. Carried by a vertical conveyor system that boggles the freaking mind. Slowly, like some mad game of Tetris, a new room assembles itself from the empty spaces between the blocks. Its not even that big. The size of a large office - with floor and ceiling of glowing, pulsing, blue.. Dang.. I whisper, and it echoes off concrete and glass. I step out onto the pure, cool, surface - and crouch. Staring down into a pristine world, sealed against time. For a moment, all I see is the pulsing heart of the crono-preservation field. But there.... there inside it.... a shadowy, shrink-wrapped, pallet filled with bulging sacks of maybe simRice. And thats just one cube. Every box in here is a prize, waiting to be opened.. Vents are locked shut. Totally airtight. Kami mouths over comms as Demon sniffs one of em, and growls. Wouldnt have long, without breathers. I tap mine. Good to go. Cryo systems are green, mate. I think were good. Zip adds from the side, as Demon flicks our only handheld scanner over the sealed crates. Suspended animation is. still.... like.... suspendy?" He coughs. "Barely, I mean. Damn. After all this bloody time.... it might even be edible.. I shake my head. Plastering a hand, and eye, to the clear side of a crate. Block upon block of food staring back at me. Seems like..... one category of food per crate. Half a zillion crates. Well have to call up the ones we want manually. I hesitate. "Uh.... Is it me, or are most of em.... kinda empty.....?" "Shop''s gotta still be restocking, mate. Expired out, new in." Kami hisses. "Expired out.... where? Into the tower?" "Bet on it, mate..... Some kinda chute. Sealed up, probably." "Crap." I groan. "No wonder the bloody monsters ain''t starvin''." "So, what I''m hearing...." Kami frowns, craggily, poking a hard finger at the drone loading-gates. "...is the drones think the shit on the shelves is still good." "Easier for us if it is." I murmur, as Zip rips the plug. The pair of them staring at the smaller inner-door. Armoured, but identical to the one we just came through. Zip shrugs. Hey. Like. I know one way to find out. We bust the inner door. Same procedure, but quicker. Sliding out into the eerie dark, shimmering with sterilisation lights and chrono-fields. All of it dimmed down. Low power. A few sluggish cleaning bots making low, trundling, rounds through..... an almost literal Aladdin''s Cave of colourful packets. Gleaming with inlaid strips of gold, and silver.... And even tiny holos. With circuitry printed right in the plastic, and fed with power by the shelf itself. Keeping the tiny cartoons dancing, off into infinity. I turn on the spot. Hungry eyes picking up every treat. Every snack. Every colourful packet of gum, or shot of stim-juice, glimmering in rows behind a swooping - minimalist - counter. Its inner side lined with multi-armed robot cashiers. Mirroring the second - long - counter, directly opposite the first. Wow. Old tek. Our [Sniper] murmurs, metal fingers carving a streak of dust off of a blank white shell. That your mum? I grin. Go to hell, Spook. She snorts, slapping the side of the bot. Silence reins, for a moment. Perfect, and drifting with motes.. And then a red LED smile flickers inside that dark plastic face, and the damn thing jerks upright - all our guns whipping toward it as Kami leaps back. Every eye widening, as the entire row of machines begins to wake.. And.... > > >< < < >> The Disloyalty Program >> The Disloyalty Program Machine-arms click as dead robot cashers twitch back into life. Disturbing entire sheets of dust as they rise. Oh, my! W- W- Wel.come. to. Wheezes the one with a slashing streak across its face. .Your Friendly. Local autoMart.. Click. Whir. Lens caked in dust, focusing on nothing. "WAR-ning. This- this- Friendly Local Store is in Short Term Hiber-nation Mode! Goodness! That means you are tress- tress- tresPASSING! WARNING! INITIATING-" Which is as far as it gets before Demon tears its head clear off. Kami snarls and tosses Tufty, one-handed, right at the damn machine. He shrills, flails, and latches on - scrabbling and jerking as his hands are shocked on the wire-filled stump. But he jams his arm in it to the elbow and begins to tear, as the rest of us spread left. Me and Zip opening fire on the other counter - the one facing ours - while Demon holds our backs. I hear him hammer down on the second bot in line, literally yanking off arms like matchsticks as Tufty fights Headless. Skittering and screaming as the doomed bot splays rubbery shocker-tendrils from its back. I spot em in my peripheral, and everybody flips out of the way. But I see a flash of green rage and fire in his terrified eye. A jolt of something madder than adrenaline. Harder than steel. And he almost flickers with speed. Stabbing claws into the back-side of its case, and ripping the entire zapp-unit out. Trailing live shockers as he kicks off a pillar, then Demon''s prey. Hurling it, tentacles and all, into the feeble - groping - arms of the third bot in line. He impacts the wall beside it. Flipping backward to land on the counter, with one foot. Smack. Then backwards, again, to land on the first bot. Panting with crazed adrenaline, and smothering down his fringe. I flip onto the opposite counter as a stocker bot veers at me. Loader prongs gleaming. But that puts me right in the line of the middle bot on that side. It swings at me, and I pounce. Slamming both heels into arms and chest as its shockers begin to unfurl. But it''s damaged. Shot to hell. And I void it''s warranty with the crook of my crowbar. Smashing down through fragile - bullet-torn - shell to crack the delicate internals. It sticks, and I wrench - hard. Tearing out it metal heart, plus miles of cable and tubing. Hurling it away as I leap onto the second bot in line. Right in the middle of the row. Stabbing the barrel of my gun into a hole, and firing off an overcharged quad-shot. Smoke oozes out as the servos begin to fail, leaving me barely enough time to flip off its back. One hand hitting the counter as I launch directly off it. Slam. Onto the plastic shoulders of bot number three. Blasting its face into the counter. "Deeply sorry! E-e-e--escalating priority sit- sit- situation to our Customer Care Team-!" It jabbers as I slam my black-bladed army-knife into its neck, and jam my crowbar into the core of its limp - half-broken - shocker tendrils. Dropping it with a yelp that sends me flipping backward, onto the counter. Right as the third and final bot in line whips around. Slashing its own sticky, rubberised, feelers at my general location. Sparks snapping from the copper dots along their length. Swearing voraciously, I flip backward again to escape - and unload a quad-shot directly into its face. The thing jolts, but doesn''t fall. And the second, middle, bot is rising again - dust in its eyes as it snatches, blindly, at the blurred shapes of my team. Which is when I spot the stubby pair of extra-chunky arms sliding free from its sides. "GUNS! THEY GOT GUNS!" I roar, and jump to smash the mid-bot back into the counter. Firing directly, and repeatedly, into the core of the end machine. It jerks, spasms, and falls. Right as the one I''m stood on begins to unhook its own weapons. But I latch on, flipping my hips around to straddle it. Kicking down with tough heels to snap the fragile weapons. Then I go absolutely ham on it. "Good-ness me-me-me-me, an error! Mishandled-" "Mishandle this!" I quip, poorly. Hammering my gun into the side of its head. "Yeah! Your.... coupon.... of existence.... is expired!" "Shut up, Spook!" Kami yells, smashing a robot arm into a robot skull. Twisting it off. And hurling it into the side of a shelf-stocker bot that comes blurring past on wide, rugged, omni-wheels. The thing screeches. Spins. And launches a sticky silicone shocker-net at Tufty, who leaps - wildly - to dodge. Landing on one leg, and bounding along the counter as a second machine hoses it down with capture-gel. A plan that works great - right up until Kami beats its head inside-out with her titanium fists. Opening the airspace for Tufty leap the goo, landing on a Karen-Resistant Decoy Manager Bot. Which, it turns out, is less than GMO-proof. I leave my own prey a ruined lump of torso, flashing with red and blue lights, and leap again. Hammering down on a cleaning puck that warbles, unhappily, and drops the knife it must have stolen from the kitchen section. Leaving Demon to eviscerate the final cashier on the other side. Leaving it a doomed, twitching, mass of wires and broken circuity. Still basically active, but whats it gonna do? Waggle at u- Turrets!! Kami screams, and we all dive for cover. You cOuld have asKed for help. One of them stutters, shaking its barrel. Sorry Pol. We all grumble in unison. Retrieving our dignity from under the counter. You shoUld be. It garbles, horribly, as ruby-red lasers dart across the shop - settling on the few loose workers. TheSe are aRmOur pieRcing. A single, magnetically driven, gauss round punctures each. Shattering tile with a hideous snap. A second of consideration later, the turrets retract in a whirr of servos. Packing themselves back into the ceiling. Leaving only silence. One of the bots takes a step, then falls flat on its face. Damn, mate. Like that was. like. Zip shakes his head. Came in here, all cocky. Couldve got drilled. Over dusty ole food. Yeah. I breathe out. Shitty rookie mistake. Gettin careless. Number one thing that kills Ruin Delvers, now I think about it.." Careless! Yes! Look! Demon growls, tossing me the head of a bot. Hooligans Detected! It warbles, faintly, as I scrub dust and dirt off the murky glow branded deep into its forehead. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Revealing.. Corp Logo. Old one. Defunct. Shouldve bloody known.. I toss the thing at its body, and rub my face. Alright. Corp in play. Cant assume nothin. So keep ya eyes out. Got it? They stare at me like idiots, so I clap my hands. Cmon then! We won! So lets get bloody goin''! Clear out what you can carry! Good food only! Um. Gosh, In this place? Tufty blinks. Point noted! Grab anythin'' thats borderline edible! Kami, you got the scanner? Yep. She slaps her armour. Right then!" I nod. "She''s gonna be mobile, so grab her over if you got anythin'' weird or suspect!" I cough. "Or you think it''ll be funny. "Oi!" Fist meets hand, with a smack. And no booze, drugs, or crap like that! Got it? I aint having us sick or wasted when The L.M.G. knock our door down. Kami winces, but we get to it. Ripping tiny packages off our amour that expand into thin holdalls.... while Zip does the practical, sensible thing and jimmies the shopping-carts. We grab one of each, and split into pairs to raid the heck out of our new pantry. We then re-split in then sweets isle, and re-re-split in the cake isle - after some furious whisper-shouting. Finally settling on me and Tufty handling snacks, while they chisel a few ready-meals out of the freezer. Tufty peeps round my ankles as they storm off, then swallows. Offering me a shy hand. Like he used to, when he was small. Cold rips my insides as I pull mine away. Bit. old for that, cat-butt. I stumble out, and his face flashes with something. His ears snapping back as he whips furious eyes away. Puffing cheeks. It''s extremely adorable. Hey. I nudge a foot, and he hisses. But I jerk my head. Cmon. You can ride on the trolly. Ears perk, instantly. Gosh!! Can I ?? The kid chirps, with a little hop-and-pounce onto the front. Crouching, with perfect balance, on the thin rail as I rocket toward darkened shutters. Colours blurring as we exit the isle like its hyperspace. Landing in a bygone age, where rows of rusty-red apples gleam beneath artisanal stasis lights. Waxy pears, all neatly lined up in their plastic pockets. Dusty bananas gathered in identically printed bunches. Tufty snuffles, cautiously, at the shrink-wrapped treats. Retrieving one with careful reverence. Wow.. Ive.. gosh. Ive only seen pictures. He breathes. Are they real? Spook? Are they? A glimmer of true hope in his eyes. "Real fruits!" I hesitate, just for a second, and sigh. Just upmarket sim-food, kid. Sorry. Real fruit wouldve rotted to nothin'' by now, stasis or no. Oh. He whispers. But do you know what they taste like? Do the pie-apples taste like the red apples? Pineapples. I snort, lifting one. But nah.." Then gain, I only had it once before Surface crap got banned. and that was a long, long, long time ago..... A world of cracked yellow memories, and adults five miles tall. Um. He blinks. D-didnt that all happen a hundred years ago?? Were you really- Nah. Bans got started then. But it didnt catch up to food or stuff like that til much later. And didn''t spread where we were til I was, uh.. six I think? I toss the fake fruit into the air, and catch it. I still bloody remember it. First they vanished all the stuff that looked like animals. Plants. All that stuff. Then, a little later, it was fruit and foods. And they bloody told us they were gonna stop there! Hah! Really?? Welp. Either that, or Im yankin your chain. I grin. Try to guess which. Mean. He sticks his tongue out. Um can I try one?? Only Ive never had fruit before. Even not-real fruit.. Hold on. Lets take a look.. I flip the plastic-wrapped thing again. Mmmm. Sticky, but still pretty firm. Smells kinda fruity.. Better take a closer look. I flick a quick glance around, then open my left palm. Tufty huslting in to block us from view as little lights flicker between my fingers. Fine lasers criss-crossing the stacks as I sweep my scanner-implant across the display. Tagging every fruit I can see with a coloured outline. Ah! Why did you scan me?? No reason. I snort. Now. Let''s see.
Farmer Franks noFruits'' (Various) Synthetic food item. Age: 78.5 years Stability: Moderate Edibility: Questionable Other: Items exhibits signs of being held in long-term stasis. Born in the mythical First Era of The City, when << DATA CORRUPTED >> noFruits later became slang for any form of succulent confectionery designed to look, smell, and taste like ''real'' fruit. Reports vary about the accuracy of this claim; with most claiming they merely taste like artificial sweets. However; noFruits persisted as a popular & nostalgic desert long after the Funeral Of Nations.
Humanoid GMO (Neko Form) Synthetic lifeform - Cybernetic Age: 12.7 years Stability: Moderate Edibility: Questionable Implants: Wired Reflexes, Berserk, Pain Ray, Military-Grade Brain Augmentations (Various), Grade D Ichor Nanites. Other: Subject appears to have suffered massive head-trauma. Small & generally slight, Nekos are a Feline GMO variant known for their speed and agility. Standing about half to three-quarters the average human height, they have typically quite minor feline features. For example: catlike eyes, ears, tail, and (rarely) some limited fur. While Nekos are only considered half GMO by the Post Human Alliance, due to their limited animal traits, the breed is nevertheless one of the most populous Feline variants to have appeared over the last two centuries.
Welp. Good enough to sell as antiques, at least.. Not you, I mean. I toss the noFruit again. Pretty rare find, too. Bet we could make a- I do a quick Badger-check. -total bomb on these, to the right guy.. Or trade em for some actual fresh snacks, maybe....." Oooh! Gosh! Maybe well be rich! Tuffy purrs and hops, happily clutching his cheeks. And can we try some?? Wouldnt count on ''rich''. I snort. But yeah. Dump a box out, and well grab two of each. One to try, and one to tryn sell. A few seconds later, we drop the case into the trolley, and Tufty pops up on the side to sniff it happily. Curling up on the corner of the cage, like a figurehead, as we scoot down the biscuit isle. Scanning and grabbing as we go. Oh! Can we get the big Rooshas Caramel Cookies!? The triple chocolate ones!? Nah, theyre fifty credits. I tease, waggling the cart. Ya think Im made of imaginary outdated money? Huffff! He floofs his fringe. Whopping my arm with his tail. But really? Really? Heh. Ysure do open up when its just us.. I chuckle as he bops me again - huffing hugely. Alright! Alright! Scan away. Get two. But put em in the dont let Gremlin see it pile. With an excited little hop, he swipes his left hand over the gleaming stack in a glitter of rainbow energy. Awakening every little holo cartoon, even as he shines his own little light. And then pauses. Um.. uh What? Um, theres..... weird stuff in them? "Weird? What?" I blink, flipping his screen to see the ingredients. "Lets see. Synthetic sugars. sweeteners, coal-dyes, artificial flavourings, bulking agents, smoothing agents, creaming agents, numbers, preservatives, artificial flour, waxes, carcinogens, perfuments, salt, synthetic oils, metals, plastic. and synthetic vitamins too!" I grin. "Sounds bloody awesome!" Gosh? Um? Really? Metals and perfumes and poisons, though?? Tufty sticks a tongue out. Yuck! Yep! Just what a growing GMO needs! I cough. If theyre a scaly lil bin. He slicks his tongue out. Mlem! Shed eat the wrap, too! Yeah. I snort. Plus the bag they came in. The shelf. The floor under it. Maybe a nearby wall, too.. In fact. I add, in a slower voice. Were gonna need a lil monster proof place to store this. We grab some synthetic jerky off a hanging thing, plus a nice choco-nut-marshmallow spread to dunk our healthy snacks in. Specifically the jerky, if they''re Badger. Then we swing down the chiller isles for ice cream. And stop. Abruptly. Uh. W-whats that? Tufty trembles, shrinking into a quiet huddle in the basket and peering over the edge. I slow the cart to a stop at the edge of the darkened isle. Its a dead spot. Darker than even the dim-lit isles. No stasis lights. No light at all. But there.... ....in the chillers.... .....something.... ....squirms.... > > >< < < >> Infernal Infection >> Infernal Infection Cool tile stretches from eyeballs to infinite darkness. Walls of glass pressing inward, on both sides. My heart, settled after the fight, begins to thrum as my sense pick up an unsettling wrongness. a feeling that blooms into reality as my eyes track along the wall of dead freezers on one side, and the mass of fridges on the other. Tufty shrinking deeper into the trolley as our gazes slip along steamed glass doors. Tracking across eerily normal pots of ice cream, gleaming with happy little cones and waffles. Normal. Yes. Normal, right up until they aren''t. Until they erupt into a florid carnage of mould and fungus. A mayhem of fronds and unhealthy colours. With fringes of fluff that give way to glass that writhes with slithering, slickening, sliming corruption. With things of unsettling movement and texture that press and suck against windows once filled with childish treats. Ending in a wild explosion of strands as thick as branches. A fungal tree almost ready to rip free from the rotten, blackened, interior of a chiller right in the middle of the dark..... Widower Fungus. I whisper. Harmless. Um, it doesnt sound- unless ya walk near it. I add. Which is when its swings that door open and sucks your ass in. He gulps. Okay. "Or breathe in the spores." I add. "In which case-" "Nyaaah! I don''t wanna know!!" How the heck did it get in there, though? I continue in a low mutter. Place is sealed.... We stare at the monstrous, pulsating.... thing. And Tufty swallows. Um. I think I see b-bones.. Inside. U-under the glass.. Ah. I whisper. Infected. Bet thats how they spread. Mustve snuck its fungusy ass in before the place shut down." I shiver. "Ate its host, in there, with a nice bit o choco-whip fudge for desert. And.. And that thing''s.... still alive? After all this time? He wibbles. Dunno. I murmur. Monsters like that. They can wait a loong time.. But, eh, y''never know..... maybe its just rot now. I grin. Could send in a catboy to check. "Nuuu......" He hisses. Very quietly. C-can we go? Sure. Lemmie just warn the others. I tag the threat on my scopes, and slink back into the shimmering light of the store. Bringing up the others on a vScreen. "Shit. Freezers are dead?" Kami into her wrist-camera, face bulging down at me. "Just the ones the ice cream, cheese, butter, and other gross shit like that." I smirk, quietly. "Aw, mate! C''mon!" Zip''s avatar groans horribly. "Mate. Damn. You saying, like, the food ain''t safe?" "Hey. Relax. There''s bloody buckets of it in storage, and there''s a mini freezer at the front with pots-" "Spook. It could all be bad." Kami puts in, earnestly. "My scans are coming back okay, but the air scrubbers are choked off. There''s a good chance it''s been spread all over the place. Little bits mixed in with the dust, coating the packets. If we miss even one, we could all get sick. Maybe even-" I shiver and huddle a little deeper into perfect rows of packaged pretzels. All red, and green, and blue. Fighting the urge to close my eyes, and pretend the Widower doesn''t exist. To give into the hunger, and just rip through the old food like a tornado. But I take a long, hard, breath, and look up. "Pol. What d''ya think?" A flickering thing of cogs and nightmare equations unfurls into being behind me. Ticking, gently, as it considers the problem. "Sealed food will not be contaminated." It states in that same rending monotone. "Stasis lights kill spores. Bacteria. Viruses. Scanners will pick up any trace amounts on your person when you exit the shop." "Good to hear." I sigh out gently. "Likely the Widower is stable, and has been sealed within its environment for decades. However; you must remain vigilant for offshoots and contamination. Particularly in surrounding rows." "Either way." Kami states in a slow, thinking-out-loud, tone. "We''ve got to treat this old crap as emergency supplies only, and start looking to replace it. Even the stuff in storage." "Can we sell it?" She shakes her head. "Some of it. Maybe. If it''s rare enough...." "Right." I nod, slowly. "Extra, extra, caution then. Scan everything when we exit. Including us." "Right, mate!" Kami''s eyes roll. "Sure, whatever." "Zas. We shall be." Demon sticks out his chin. I crush the vScreen, and check my breather. Just for reassurance. If this wasn''t, very probably, the only food we''ll see this month..... "No. I ain''t gonna worry." I murmur. Half the food on the Pirate tower is older, weider, and (for all I know) spent time stuck up a monster''s.... let''s not go there. So, either way, I''m just gonna trust the scans. The decision sparks a shock of something urgent in my skin. A feeling like all this food might be a one time deal. "C''mon. Let''s pile up our stash." I grunt to a gibbering kitty. And we set off again, on our little expedition. Grabbing breadables, spreadables, and Inorganic Nutrient Packs along the way. Plus a few other bits. Brushes, art supplies, and nail polish for Tufty (and Badger''s wall. And Badger''s face). A mini game keyring for Zip. A sturdy ''pest whackin'' broom for Gremlin (I hope she likes it). And so on. Tufty perks after a bit. Scampering about (and through) my legs as we go. Snuffling at things on shelves, and scanning the more dubious snacks. We hit a drinks fridge, and theres the usual war over Red Coke vs Blue. I grab some of each, to make him happy - plus a few weirder things, for political neutrality. And soon our trolly is bulging full with synthetic treats, meals, colourful packets, pop, pretzels, and (of course) indestructible neon-yellow snack-cakes. Forcing me to offload a few of the lighter items into our holdall - which I heft onto Tufty. Who drops flat on his ass, like some bugger stole his legs. Mew! This is- EEEK!!!! Uh. You alright, squirt? It''s.... literally just crisps. It aint heavy. My hand twitches toward his, but I step back at the same time. Leaving his green-clawed fingers hanging in the air. I barely catch the flash of venom and hurt as his face snaps away. Ears quivering, and flat. Then drooping, as his head sinks. A tear rolling down the one, visable, side of his face. And my hand reaches again, but clenches into a shiver of self-hate. And I turn to go. Ah. Cmon, kid. You want me to- You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. "M''fine." "Okay-" Spookie." The little neko bursts. "Yknow. Y''know.... But even his shaking voice droops, too. Drifting off into a whisper so low and glum even GMO ears can barely catch it. So low I can pretend I didnt. "You know we''re.... safe.... now..... And.... and She.. She cant see us no more.....? And....." I stare at the fallen bag. Rigid as rock, from tail to nose, as the image of our Evil Stepmother shines bright and fresh in my mind. Smiling so tenderly. So Lovingly. So.. God.... I can''t even pretend hes right. Tears burn my cheeks as well. I cant. I cant.. I cant let HER see me care for them. Because if I do. If she knows she can still hurt me by.... Shell.. I slam my hands down on the trolly, and choke. Forcing the emotion back down, into the tight little box where it belongs. And then, I simply grip the rail. Dragging the cart behind me - one handed - as pad away down the cool-tiled isles. Finding solitude and silance in the dim, strange, light..... ...as I leave the cat in darkness. But my grief is soon interupted by a spark of blue eye, and a flicking hand. "Hey mate! Mate! Up for, like, a hobnob in the biscuit isle?" He smirks, waggling a packet. "Or a jammie dodger?" "Haha. But nah. Already hit that one. I say, tossing him the keychain. "Plus, I ain''t eatin'' nothin'' till we''re all scanned." Oh! Wow! Gatcha Monsters! He grins as a cartoony 2D world of toothy critters bursts into holographic life. Damn, like. Y''know I think we had a couple of these... back at..... Joan''s house..... Yeah. I got us one each. I brush through it, dangling a handful that blip and chirp as they detect Zippers. Prompting us with icons for treasure-hunt events, battles, and trades. Nice! And you got, like, the triple-choc delux-! He jolts and stutters off into a coughing fit as Tufty skitters up behind in a clatter of claws. Dragging the bag-strap, and blinking, hugely, up at us with a big feline eye. Damn, mate, that was close. Thought it was, yknow like, Kami or something. He whispers in close as we crouch on our toes. "Did that sound like Kami?" I scoff. "Yeah, nah. Like, just heard a noise." He coughs again. "But, yeah, that reminds me..... Shes been, like, creeping about? Y''know? I saw her. sort-of, like-" He spins a finger to encompas the store. "I mean, shes not been with me. Or Dee. Shes not? I blink. Wait. Where is Dee? End of the isle, mate. Keeping watch. He checks his comms are off, then checks again. Mate. I think, like, shes up to something? Maybe? He twitches his head toward the counter. Over there? Or maybe, like. Think shes spyin'' on us? I mutter as his left hand shimmers with light that gleams off foil packets. He shuts it, quickly, snuffing the scanner. Stuffing a pack of chocolate orange Jiffy Cakes in his bag Maybe. Dunno mate. Zip shurgs. But, like, she keeps. creeping-? All our heads - and my ears - spin in every direction. Scanning dark shelves loaded with glittering bargains. Nothing. I meet his wincing gaze. If she gets wind about- I tap my left hand. -shit may get very real very fast. His teeth clench. Maybe not, though? Right? Omega Zeros to the end? Right? SheNo. Damnit. Theres no telling how shell react- Another weird noise. I shush him, and duck back out, around the trolley. Prowling along the middle isle, on all fours. Head low, and hunting. If she''s necking the hooch.... eh. I never saw her. But. The sound again. From near the counter. And, this time, a waft of perfume - laden with eu de scraggly [Sniper]... I slip toward the checkouts, past ruined bots, and more. Until I see her spidery shadow spread high across the wall by the counter. Lit by the flicker of dead machines. Damn. whats she doing? I put knuckles on the floor, and raise clawed toes to keep them from clicking. Pad. Pad. Pad. Gentle as can be. Mind your tail on the outcrops..... Dont let it touch. I jerk back from the corner. Shit, shes twitchy. Keeps- Oi! Spook! Are y-you bloody creeping about back there!? I can s-see your dot on the scope! Kami stutters in a weirdly terrified voice, and I jump upright. Grabbing a bottle of squash at random as I step out into view. Trying for casual, and failing by a mile. Hey I was just- Shit, shes the only one with a handheld scanner. -scoping the juices. Wanted your opinion? Yeah right, Spook. Youre spying. She flips her braids back. Beads clattering against the glass cabinet behind her like angry, nervous, nails. You are, arent you? Hah. Nooo? I was- shit shit shiiit. Look, alright, fine. I was creepin about. But I werent looking for you. I was- Y-you werent. Huh? She snaps, as I slink out into view. Clutching my bottle of horrible squash like a shield. Yeah, look. I take a step closer, and she jerks back. Keep it down-low, but Zip thinks he saw Badger. He did, huh? Whered he see him then!? She folds all her metallic arms. Eyes flashing me up and down - then behind me. Meanwhile, I keep my gaze level and cool. Avoiding even a glance at the Luxury Perfumes advert playing above her head. Or the wall of artistic bottles and boxes behind her. The words Thought you hated girly stuff? nudging their suicidal way up my throat. But I head them off. Eh. No idea. Probably helping Gremmy stuff her scaly lil gob. I hoick a thumb at the Pick n Mix Corner by the tills, and cyber-girl frowns. Gritting her teeth as Plausible Deniability worms its sneaky way into the conversation. Yeah. Sure. She scoffs. Storming past me to peer around the island of gumball dispencers. She looks left. She looks right. And then she turns to me, and drops he arms. Well. Where are they? Hey. I said I was huntin em. Never said I found- Right. She heel-stomps over to me, and aims a poke that snaps my ears flat. Somethings up, here, so spill it. No touching. I told ya. I growl. Giving her my most innocent angry glare. Cut the crap, Spook. Whats going on? Her mouth is thin and angry. Her eyes flared with rage. Her hard face a mess of hollow cheeks. Lines. Dark bags. Scars. But beneath it, soft as breath, is the faintest waft of floral perfume. A fog of it that rolls off her fingers in exotic, guilty, clouds. As if she sniffed a tester-bottle, then quickly put it back. Hoping nobody would see. Kami. I state in calm, cold, surity. There aint nothin going on here. Were all sneakin about. So just deal with it. I whip away. Feeling her shake with rage behind me. Twisted up in her own trauma, until shes ready to snap. And then she does. Look. I just- I thought that crapd make good scent bombs! Alright!? Thought some rancid old stink would throw off our Stepmothers bloody GMOs. Okay. I hesitate, tail tilting as I half-turn. Thats cool. Didnt think o that. And theyre pre-packaged too.. I try for a fangy smile. But her face is white-hot carnage of roaring emotion. All of it crushed, tightly, into something barely reminicent of neutrality. Want me to help ya find the nastiest-? She waves me off. No. No, its fine. Youre GMO. Im not. One sniff, and youll blow out your sense of smell for hours. So. So just go. go. do something.. Right. Sure.. Ill. Ill do a quickie Badger patrol. I stutter. Yeah. Thats a good idea. She almost sags in relief. You better. His idea of scanning stuff is to go beep beep and wave a packet of jaffa cakes over it. Tbe fair, thats a great way to find out if Gremlins hiding behind it. I finish, wrly, quickening off toward the stacks. But she clears her throat, suddenly. Spook. I turn, one last time. But she scrunches her bone-white eyebrows. Looking away. Spook. If you ever wanna. I blink. Do what? Talk? Hang out? Learn to dance? Summon a demon? .shit. Never mind.. Kami. You. You dont gotta lie if. I stop, still, as her face turns hard as graven rock. Nobody told a lie here, unless you did. Spook. Right. I mutter in the still darkness, while everything inside me screams at her. Shakes her. Slaps her. And yells shes allowed to like things, Goddamnnit. But.. if I told her. .Id have to tell myself, too.. So, instead, I vanish off into a shadowy tunnel of flickering adverts and shining plastic packaging. Determined to enjoy our time exploring this little, forgotten, wonderland. But what am I even doing? What if.. I snap a hard turn into the cake-isle, and Tufty jumps clear off the floor. Dropping the can of synthetic tuna he was all but sexually harassing. EEEK!! Oh! Um! Gosh! Heeey, whats going on Spookie? I, um, huh, um.. He mewls up at me. Glancing back at Demon, some way down the isle. Looking for Badge and Grem too, huh? I smirk. Ah, um, uh.. maybe? He mumbles, hiding the tin away in my holdall. Yknow. I say, yanking a couple of bags off the stand. I bet hed randomly appear outta nowhere if we started loading up on. I check the pack .toffee fudge eclairs. Oh? Um? Gosh! You really think so?? I wink at the cat. Cant hurt to check. >>><<< >> A Feast For One >> A Feast For One "So when''s the next mission?" Kami grumbles, dangling an unhappy Badger by the ankles. "Food or not, our supplies are low. Our cash is zero. If the Night Tyrant breaks, we''re bloody toast. "Yahhh! Spook! Help! I was just-" Dunno mate." Zip shrugs, widely. A feisty Gremlin in one hand, a spare holdall in the other. And a Demon hovering behind, itching to step in. "Clients ain''t, like, all that keen on us. Y''know? I mean, like, being-" "Well, we better bloody fix this soon!" She continues, waving a lil idiot. "It''s dumb as heck that we only have one scanner between all of us. I had to bloody scan everything myself! " "Told ya. When we get more money." I grin, sheepishly, Helping Zip secure the struggling bag. "Scanners cost more than bloody armour.... even if ya make em yourself." Kami sighs, shaking the snack-cakes out of Badger''s underwear. "Spook. If I find out you''re pranking me, and there''s a box with a bajillion scanners upstairs...." Zip lets of a resounding snort. "Hey,. Mate. Like, y''know we''d never do that." He chuckles with false innocence, tickling Badger''s armpits so he squeals even louder. "Definitely not." I add in. Swinging the Gremlin-bag in mad, squealy, circles. "We''d never do nothin'' that weren''t bloody not-nice. Y''know that, right?" Kami''s brow scrunches, fighting to unpick the quadruple-negative. Giving up with a stolid snort, and a snarl. "RRRGGH! Whatever, Spook....! You ass! I''m gonna start carting all this nonsense upstairs!" "Wooooo! I''ll help!" Yells a tiny, inverted, voice. "Shut it! You''re the bloody nonsense I''m talking about!" She roars, shaking him up into a furious blur of eyeballs. HEEEELP!!!!!! SPOOK!!! HEEELP!!! I''M DYING!! Oh no. If only I could." I grope at the air, feebly. "But you''re so far away. YAAAaaaAAAaaaHHH! SPOOOOK! HEEELP!!!! Whoops! Im getting further and further away! I laugh, spinning my sack of sneaky dumbass. "EEEE!! SssssPOOKieeeesss!!! Nuuuu!!!" It squeals, wiggling furiously. Tough luck, squirt! I cackle in glee as we enter the warehouse, with trollies and bags in tow. "Heh. It''s gonna be hard getting through all this food, what with these two are stuck on army rations for a week!" "BLAAAGHHH!!!" Badger wails. "GROSSSS!!!" Should have bloody thought about that earlier!" Kami growls, jabbing the warehouse controls with his foot. "Before you clowns went bloody sneaking about a bloody monster-infested lobby on your own!" "Speaking of bloody sneaking." I growl, dragging two trollies behind me as we cross the warehouse. "Five trollies worth of grub ain''t gonna fit in one lift. Not with all of us, too - even if half of it''s in bags. We need a damn plan here." "Two up, two down?" Kami suggests, as massive blue storage-cubes begin to shift around us in a pre-arranged pattern. "One lot guards the lift, and sends food up in bits? Others unload, and guard it? Then the first lot follows?" I scratch an ear, fidgeting with the point. "Rmmm.... not sure about that. This stuff is heavy. Bulky. We walk outta here loaded down, pushing carts, we can''t defend ourselves. We get caught out there, we''re kinda done-for. Plus we just picked up some spare bags." I nod as prickly lil claws jab through the surface of one, ripping furiously. "Not a chance." "Yeah, mate, and - like - some of it''s gotta go in the Night Tyrant, for.... uh.... snack emergencies." Zipper coughs, shunting another trolley as the glassy blocks hem us into a space by the exit. Shifting walls humming with strange light. I tap my claws on one, for a second, then cock my head. "We gotta leave half of it here. Make two.... three trips." "On its own? With the door half-bust?" Kami winces. "Spook, there''s all kinds of nasty little crawly-" "You can jam it. Or we could stick it inna cube." "Look. I..... I-" Her fingers twitch a little. Pain on her face. "I''d.... I''ll stay and watch it." "What?" I blink. "No way. C''mon. It''ll be fine. It''s been here this long-" "Even so." She says. Almost like a compulsion. And I know that look. "....Fine. But I''ll watch it. You got too many arms to not be carrying stuff." "Perhaps it would be wise to place additional guards-" Kami gives me the finger, six times at once - Badger landing flat on his face. "Shut up, Spook. I just-" She breathes out hard. "Fine. Fine, but you better-" "Oh. I will. I''ll watch it real good." I grin, tinkling my merry claws along the fudge-cakes. "Sounds awesome, mate." Zip says, cheerfully stuffing a dazed idiot into a second holdall. "So, like, which garbage chute are we stuffing these down?" "MMMPPH!!!" "EEEE!!! HISSSS!!! NUUUsss!!!" "Eh, surprise me." I shrug as the last of the huge cubes finally locks into place, forming a wall nearly as thick as the warehouse is long. I study it for a second, and curse. Eyes widening. "Oh.... crap. Are these all the empty ones?" I turn my eyes to the other panel - which flickers. Displaying a familiar, clockwork, abomination. Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator. "Correct." It states in a voice of metal death. "The code for our new Automated Wall Defence is now in working Beta. The system is comprised entirely of unused containers, which can be shifted to imprison or crush intruders." "Shit..... that''s a lot of bloody empties though....." I mutter, as cold hunger twists in my gut. "More than I bloody thought." "It is is to be expected. Warehouse stock has been depreciating for over seventy years. What remains is largely pasta, rice, and inorganic materials." "Mostly those weird yellow snack cakes." Kami chimes. "Still....." I mutter, shanking my head. "I instructed the internal drones to pack the crates more efficiently, and to hide them under the stack." It explains. "This is why it seems more empty than before." "It''ll do." I breathe at last. "Shit, I mean, we knew this was gonna be finite..... But damn...." "Hey. Like, it didn''t have to be here. So it''s a bonus. Right?" Zip shrugs again, as me and Tufty eye the food. "Guess so. But I ain''t seeing any bullets, guns, cash, or other supplies in here." I warn, nudging a trolley. Fretfully. "And we''re running out of those, too." "Not my bloody fault." Kami rips at her cloak. "I ran out of 88 calibre ammo, and the pistols are shit at armou-" "Right. Right." I wave her down, carefully, before she does herself some damage. "Just sayin'' we gotta get our bloody asses in gear. Get ourselves a payin'' mission. Or else sell a buncha-" "Ah.... Yeah, uh.... like, maybe let''s leave out the ''or else'' mate...." Zipper chuckles, rubbing the back of his neck. "Uh huh." I grin. "Hey, that reminds me, how''s your shiny new Carrier doin''?" "Uh, fine mate. Still putting it back together, like...." He winces. "Anyways, we gotta get this food locked up! Yeah?" "Oh yeah." I grin even wider. "Maybe in a nice fancy gold box, if we sold-" "See you later mate! Gotta go!" He yelps, hustling Kami and Demon out the door in a whirlwind of trollies and bags. Tufty and Demon helping to drag the two lil idiots behind them. The door locks.... sort of. And then I''m alone. "Oh, bloody finally." I groan. Ripping a meaty bag of crisps off the stack, and laying into them with a fury. "Oh Gofft! Fuud! Fuud! Oh-" I crunch happily, ignoring the slightly musty aftertaste. Half the bag is powder., but I shovel it in good. Stuffing the evidence into my gear, and pouncing on a tube of ''GENUINE Fruity Nonsense!?''. Which, I assure you, contains exactly 0% genuine fruity anything. But what they do got are big, gooy, gummy slices of ''orange'' or ''lemon'' or ''lime'' that burst with flavourful juices. Crunching their sweet little sugar rinds against my teeth as I chew. They even look like actual fruit. Like little reminders of a far gone place.... for a far-gone people who still believed in a Sky..... A Surface. And that maybe they''ll go back there, one day.... Just maybe..... And still the thoughtless hunger pushes me on. Pushing me to wolf down treats that are all just a bit too sticky. Or soft. Or hard. Or crumbly. Or squashed. With weird little wonky bits, or molten chemical goo in all its funky colours. Except..... I''m just gnawing through an entire pack of sausages, when suddenly I pause. Jolting out of my furtive huddle, and stuffing the rest into my satchel. Eyes quick. Ears Quicker. One hand slipping down to touch my SMG. Pangs of hunger and frenzy giving way to a dull little tingle of dread. And a sudden awareness.... The tiny warehouse is silent, and cool, and inert. As it has been for seventy years..... "Hey.....?" I hiss over comms. "Guys....?" Nothing. Nothing but static. And the crinkle of settling food. I swallow. The sickly acid of old cola still clinging to my tongue. My barren guts clenching, even as my filled stomach curls up for a happy little nap. A tiny spark of realisation, dawning. Oh so slow. Oh so careful. So soft. Like a whisper of sudden sanity rising from beneath the roaring tsunami of rabid, screaming, stamping, howling, GMO hunger. I''m not alone with a feast, it says. I am a feast that''s all alone. Alone in a vast, monster-infested, tower. Alone, in an airtight room, in the middle of a Quarantine Isolation Zone. Very, very, very Alone.... .....while all my friends are too far away to help. "Well....... Shit." I breathe, at last, to the expectant darkness. "I''m a dumb bloody teen in a soddin'' horror movie...." It doesn''t answer. Nothing does. Nothing but the Silence. Endless. Utter. Unthinkable. Silence. The kind that rings with dull little noises, off in the undecided distance. With terrible little groans, and shifting crackles, and sinuous rumbles in the depths. Of old machines ringing down, down, down, deep - right on the edge of even my hearing. Tiny noises. Insistent and endless. But they cocoon the silence of my little hole, and twist its quiet into something.... watchful. My back finds the corner, and I ready my gun. Swallowing. Licking my lips. Eyes unfocused, to see everything at once. The moment dragging on. And on. And on. Until I start to wonder what the Hell happened to my team. Where are they? What''s going on? Surely they gotta be nearly here by now? I flick a screen into existence, but all the cameras are dead and dark.... "Polybius?" I whisper. "Guys....? Anyone....?" Tink. A sound so soft it smothers me. So subtle it might not have happened at all. I flip my SMG to full-auto, and rip a fresh mag off my armour. Slotting it to double the count. And then I do it again. Tripling my original ammo. "Fair warning." I growl, leaning the bulky mag on the floor. "Any bastard thing comes that through that door.... is gonna get bloody hosed....." The silence... thickens. And thickens again. Congealing around me, thick as molten lead, as sweat soaks into the grip-tape wrapping the handle of my gun. Eking itself out, until I imagine it was never any other way- Tink. "Who the Hell is that!?" I snap. "Say it or, suck bullets!" Nothing. I breathe harder. Licking dry lips. Maybe it''s just a busted fan, smacking it''s blade? No. No, it came from the door. Exactly, from the door..... "Who is it?" I snap again. "Speak, I shoot at the next bloody knock!" Nothing. Again. Nothing at all..... And then.... "The Raven." Whispers a dark little chorus of voices. Ripping chills up my spine, and shivers through my fingers. Flexing one of them, until it brushes the trigger. I almost scream. For all my talk.... I wasn''t expecting words..... "Who.... Who is that? If that''s you Zipper....." "You know all too well who it is...." Chuckle the low, inhuman voices. "...a-knocking at your door......" "You....." I swallow. "You ain''t bloody real. I bloody made you up....." "No...." The things murmur, after an infinite moment. "We made you up....." "What....." I choke. "What the Hell does-?" "Fruitless. Pointless. We come as a friend. We come as an ally of old. But.... the child cannot be spoken to. No, it cannot....." I hear something rasp. Like many little mouths licking at all kinds of too-fine teeth. "But we will be back. Yes we will. We will..... always..... be back." Things touch at the reinforced door. Shifting it, gently. As if the thing outside could merely push, and tear it clear out of the wall. "We are forever..... And we are never going to leave..... Never..... Not until every promise is fulfilled. And every lie is broken......" "For- Forever.....?" "Did you expect less? Did you expect more?" The thing doesn''t laugh. Doesn''t even sigh. "Beware, child. Your lessons are not over. Your teacher is abroad. And..... And we are but the first..... who will rap your door this night." It pauses, new voices twisting up through the others. Like oily worms in a pot. "And it..... is already here....." The feeling of pressure drops, suddenly. Sharply. As if the thing simply ceased to be. And I am left with only a fog of quiet pressing against my senses, as if.... Slowly, with a pop, my cameras begin to come back online. Hallways. Stairways. And everything in-between. I flicker a glance across the lobby - even though we''re never, ever, meant to trust what they show us..... It''s empty. I unhook the third mag on my gun, and pad towards it. Landing, softly. Silently. Spreading my foot before it accepts even a fraction of my weight. The door is.... still. A feeling of emptiness. But I pull a tool from my belt, and slot it into the edge. Wheedling it open just enough to thread a camera out.... Still nothing..... "I''m bloody hearin'' things.... Gotta be....." I mutter, checking the sealed room''s O2 levels. Still safe, but tipping into the yellow. Better crack the door, in any case..... They''ve got to be nearly back by now. "....Omega Zero, check in?" God, movie vibes again. Things hiding above doors..... I angle the camera up, but there''s only dark. And golden trim. And mirror. My eyes flick back to the gage. It''s not moving. But..... My whole body freezes. Breathless. There.... In the reflection of the door..... There''s..... ....a second face.... It smiles at me. And then- > > >< < < >> Mirror, Mirror >> Mirror, Mirror My reflection warps with horror in the shadowy steel door.... but nothing so wild as the thing behind me. Crooked leather fingers slam my helmet into the metal. Leaving me barely able to see the room at all, except for the finest sliver of half-shadow face gathering behind me. A demon smile splitting it, as my armoured joints begin to creak.
## Impact :: [Cranial]
"Situational awareness, kiddykins." A familiar voice breathes, every word ripe with dark mockery and hideous amusement. "Wouldn''t want to take a bullet in the ass. Or maybe worse." It leans in close to my soft ear. "I like worse." I twist my head, violently, but I can''t slip free. My skull jammed into the metal so hard I''d be a headless corpse without my helmet. But I''m bloody tenacious. I scream, and slam the eject. Fuzzy ears jerking, painfully, as I rip them free of my armour. Leaving it behind as I duck away, into a roll. SMG swinging to smack my face as I fumble it up. Locking into a kneeling position as I aim. For a single instant, my helmet hangs in the air. Supported on nothing. Creaking as it is pressed, hard, against the metal. And then it tumbles, with a thunk, and gently rolls to one side. There''s nobody here. Nobody..... but me..... Breathless, and afraid, I snap my gun in every direction. Eyes wild and wide. Tail slashing the air as I try to feel for the creature - or whatever it is. Hunting reflections. Shadows. Nightmares that flicker in walls of shining glass, as if the thing is always behind me. But it''s gone. I''m alone, again. Locked in a shining cube of stacked-up stasis crates, while the air runs out. With nothing more than trollies and bags for cover. "You...." I whisper, spinning on the spot. "Where the Hell are....?" "Here and there...." It purrs, so quietly. So mockingly. So lovingly, it hurts. "Or, perhaps, nowhere at all? Did you think of that? Perhaps I''m just a mirage....." A flicker of reflection, slick and fast. I turn, at speed, but all I see is myself. "Sweet little things do have such wild imaginations, after all...." Another flicker, deeper in the cubes. A shape. A twitch of colour..... "You see and hear all..... kinds..... of things that aren''t really there..... But...." It whispers, and I jolt in terror as half skull of silver gleams in the glass by my face. "....while you''re busy pretending.... how about a little chat? ''Delusion'' to ''delusional wretch'', as it were....?" "Moon....." I choke as the image vanishes in a flurry of red coat and darkness. A flash of teeth, and glee. "But of course, my pet! And what should we talk about, I wonder?" "Quit the bloody game." I spit as I back toward the door. "You bloody know what ya came for! So talk!" Dark and hideous laughter echoes against shining-hard glass. "An answer. Child. And nothing more." It says, so very softly. Yet building its volume with rabid intent. "Your freedom is give, as promised. But will you honour our Deal? Will you follow me to power? Wealth? Security? Safety, and madness and bloodshed and comfort? And a legion of followers at your every call....? Or.....?" It licks my sharp ears with cancerous tongues. ".....is the happy little filth-digger going to Try My Patience?" I whip around. Fangs gritted. "Bullshit! You ain''t here for ''answers''!" I snarl with a hissing fury of certainty. Gun dancing between shadows as I hunt its real form. "You''re here to keep the bloody pressure on! To keep us afraid! To-" A finger flicks my ear, and I spin again. But.... But there''s still nothing.... Mere shivers of ink, dancing in every corner. "Is that what you think I am?" Moon''s voice slithers in my other ear. "A waking nightmare?" "Always." I whisper, and it laughs at my mistake. My admission of fear. But let it. Let it think it''s won, while I find a way to fight it. A flicker of vile touch across the back of scalp that panics my heart. "Is that''s so....?" It chuckles behind me, turning as I do to keep the finger pressed to my head. "But then.... don''t you want me on your side? A devil in your corner, as it were?" No. I don''t. But it needs me. Specifically, me. And it needs me badly. I''m the Leader. Not just of my team, ''Omega Zero'', but the whole of Omega Core.... whatever''s left of it. Plus The School Rebellion itself. We''re fractured, out here. Tossed to the wind by our escape. But I''ve got a damn funny feeling we''re the only ones that can hear Moon''s voice..... That we''re the only ones that can see it, or feel it. That the nightmare is just an AI Clone running on our private Network. And, damn me, but if I want to kill The Real Moon.... I need that weapon it promised us. I need the intel it''ll have to feed us to make this ''rescue'' happen. Not just intel on itself, but on The School as well. The staff. And the... other..... things that lurk there.... And to do that, I need to get onboard. Fully. Completely. At least until we can subvert the Clone AI. But if I''m too eager, it''ll know something''s up. So I need to be ''forced into it''. I need to let it ''win''. And, as much as I hate the idea.... I need to play victim. "You ain''t on anyone''s side." I growl, backing towards the door. Then rushing. Slamming my back into it, so I can face the room at large, reaching to haul on the wedged-in tool. Yanking it, shakily, open. Inch by terrified inch. Until it sticks suddenly tight. As if something huge pressed a hand against it. Long, sharp, leather-clad fingers streak down its surface. Jabbing hard into my neck, right under the armoured collar. Gripping me by the neck, and pressing me into the metal. "Is it so hard to believe I need a little friend? That I can be grateful? Gentle?" It breathes as I twist in its grip. Still dragging the pry tool. "Can''t you just.... help out little old Moon?" "DIE IN A FIRE!" I choke, and a gloved hand reaches from behind me. Pressing my mouth shut, as I struggle and kick and try to get away. Hammering both feet into the door, and slamming back against it. So hard I feel my tail going numb. If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. "Oh. The little children have such vile manners." It whispers, so very slowly, as my breath locks against the pressure smothering my face. "You made a Deal. Sweet Thing. Signed in blood, and carnage. And that''s the end of it." I scream against the hands that pour through the jam of the door in a torrent of shadow and tar. Grabbing my arms. My legs. Slamming me back into the metal. It feels to real. But it isn''t. It can''t be- "Oh but does the precious little kiddykins still think it knows better?" Moon licks at my neck with its sordid mouths. "Thinks it can hide from Mummy, under the bed? All giggling! And grinning! And hoping she can''t SEE!!?" More hands bind my waist and crotch as I strain and buck to get away. "But you know. You KNOW. You know this little hide-hole CANNOT last...." The dark strokes my face, with terrible fingers. Its face against the side of mine. Reflected eyes burning with a violent mockery of life. "You. Saw. Her.... Today..... Didn''t you, my ''Poppet''?" It murmurs against my neck, and I go suddenly still. Unbreathing. Unmoving. Lungs pounding. "She told me, you know. She was here. She stabbed her little pinky-finger in your brain. Made you see things. Feel things...." It slithers across my hands. My face. "I do hope you didn''t let her inside you...." It tuts. "If you did.... well.... then.... you better start running. And running! Before she drags you out by your little toesies! And spanks your little bum! And sends you back to School!" I drag a screaming breath, and choke. But the thing smothers me again. "Or maybe not.... not if she''s having a real No-Good Frowny-Face Day. Maybe she''ll just send Mister Gentle to crawl under the bed with you, and tickle your little skin....." Fingers jab and wiggle in my neck, as its mouths devour my scent in a single violent breath. "Tickle, and tickle, and then tickle some more! Like mutant maggots wiggling in flesh! Tickle and tickle, til there''s nothing left but happy little bones!" I shut my eyes. I don''t have to fake the tears. "You see, ''Poppet'', she isn''t as nice or friendly as me." It purrs, with absolute truth. "So pick your poison. Kiddy. Because it won''t be long til'' it picks you. And Daddy Dearest... oh my.... if he finds you too...." Hot flesh laps my face. My eyes. Up in my nose. "Well then. You know how Mummy and Daddy have a thing. How they compete. I don''t like your chances, I weally weally don''t....." I slam my legs back as my head begins to crack with pressure and pain. Can''t breathe. Can''t breathe.... Can''t even feel the freaking floor, as it drags me up the damn air, and.... Oh God, I can''t breathe. I''m- "Running out of time, aren''t you? Tickity tick..... Bit by bit....." Moon purrs, as my knees inch out - tearing a leg free. Right until it grabs my ankles, slamming me back onto the door. "Funny, really, because I''ve got all night. But I suppose I better give you another chance. So go on. What''s your answer? Will you? Won''t you?" A sudden breath slams into my lungs, and I cough and spit against its grip. Fighting the web of arms crushing me to the door. I choke. I gasp. I pull in breath until I can finally scream "-uck you, asshole....!" "Me?" It gasps, in scandal and shock, as the hand slams back onto my face. "Little old Moonie? But I''m just giving you a little push to help you on your way..... Aren''t I?" It grinds my head into the door. "See? Little pushes!" It jokes as I glare at the twisted half-half face through the gripping fingers. "So you can''t blame me when it''s all your fault...." I twist my head from the grip and spit again. Sucking as much air as I can. "I SAID F-" Hands of smoke jam their fingers down my throat, and Moon lets out a worn little sigh. "The boys and girls will learn. Or not, I suppose. And it''s not like I need all of you. There are.... ooh, how many Omega Teams are left right now? Hm..... One.... two.... thr-" With a massive wrench, I plant my feet on the door and heave myself off it. Arching my back, my arms, and everything as I rip one arm free to smash my fist through the broken-necked face. It roils like smoke around the blow, and I howl with rage and denial. Twisting to plant both pads on the door, and kick myself off it into a clumsy flip. I land, hard, and tumble onto my ass. Staggering. Choking. Gasping for breath, as the world tumbles and spins. I land on my side. Head cracking with pain, like a vice. Vision blurred. Heart pounding like a freaking hammer as I raise my SMG, and try to aim. Gun rattling in my grip as shadowy hands and faces drown the door in woven darkness. Easy target. Even now. But the instant my finger touches trigger, I freeze as an image from Basic Training stabs through my battered skull. A flickering roar of rain. A broken building. And Moon''s foul laughter, wild and raw, as my bullets tear its coat. Cracking the window behind it. And the kid behind that. Perfect, smoking, holes drilled deep into flesh. He stares at me, and- "No....." I sneer, into the floor. Drool spattering my chin. "You''re just a damn.... walkin'' delusion..... Like you said." My claw flicks open the camera-screens. Every view covered in suspicious, sifting, darkness..... and fingers..... and mocking eyes. It''s as good as confirmation.. "My damn Team is out there! Ain''t they!? Right outside that bloody door!" I swallow. "You just.... tried to kill my bloody friends....." "I don''t need dead weight." Moon purrs. "I need a monster." "And you..... you bloody think I wouldn''t kill ya myself if-" A single thought hits my half-dead brain like a bullet. Sudden, and sharp. A realisation so pure, and basic, it stabs through the haze. The confusion. The pain. And breaks my mind with fury. Stopping me cold. That bastard....... It wouldn''t. Even Moon..... "An acceptable gamble. Sweet child." Moon purrs as inky, long-fingered, hands crawl up the walls in a boiling wave. And I... break. I absolutely lose my mind. "I.... KNEW.... IT!" My scream roars as loud as my lungs will allow. Gun wavering as I curse, then shove it away. "You..... You absolute BASTARD!! I KNEW IT!! You-" I stagger up. Hurling bags and trollies aside, with a crash and a bang. "You freakin''- You-" I slam my teeth shut, and hiss. Clawing at my face. But the words won''t stop. The fury won''t stop. I scream, kicking claws clear though a bag. Ripping it wide open. Splattering cake, and cream, and childish things. Because I nearly said it. Nearly gave the bloody game away. Right then. Nearly showed all my cards to the enemy. "I KNEW IT!" I scream again, changing direction to cover the damn flub. "YOU SICK BASTARD! YA NEVER WANTED A BLOODY ALLIANCE! Y''JUST WANT TO BLOODY TORTURE US! TO MAKE US AFRAID SO WE DO WHAT YOU BLOODY SAY!" It''s not even a lie. But I grip at my face. Clawing. "That was your BLOODY PLAN all along! ....WASN''T IT!? You ain''t here for anythin'' but your own SICK PLEASURE! To make us HURT so we STAY IN LINE!" I stagger away from the boiling door. Heaving breath. So wrought with wrath I can''t even think. But the dark hands won''t let me escape. Not now. They pour across the ceiling. Weaving a sinuous net of blackened void and horrendous laughter. But I barely pay it any heed. Moon isn''t here to kill me. It can''t. It''s all a lie, no matter how much my body tells me I was bloody suffocating. It has to be. And I can see now. Through the half-truths, the darkness, and the lies, to the tiny shard of truth burning behind them all. Suddenly bright enough to touch..... Because now I know Moon''s real plan. And it is beautiful. Simple. Even childish. And why not? Moon is a monster driven by the heart of a nasty, vile, evil little child. A sadistic, twisted, nasty little bully with way too much power. Goading us. Sneering at us. Dropping little hints it thinks will go right over our ''stupid little heads'', so it can rub them right in our faces. But not nearly as smart as it thinks it is. And it slipped up. It told too much. Unless it has some deeper trick in play.... Some scam within a scam.... No. I''m bloody sure of it. It fits way too hard. And it''s every bit as mad as the laughter echoing around the warehouse, as it slithers down the walls. Pouring across glowing glass to blot the world with darkness. Shutting out the light, and leaving me alone. Inside it. But it can''t undo what it just did. What it told me, without telling me. And so, even as the dark reaches for the floor, I splay my claws to fight. To protect the kindling light of hope within me. Because this changes everything. Everything. "Ya see.....?" I whisper. Coiling, viciously, on all fours as the floor begins to shrink. A pool of colour in a roaring torrent of void. "I ain''t the useful bloody idiot you think I am. Am I? I worked out your damn plan, like it was nothing!" I heave a breath, as trollies tumble into oblivion. Falling forever. And ever. Not real...! Not real! "And.... And..... Four years of Hell..... Four years, and I got you figured out..... Moonie..... I see right through ya. You got nothin''." I choke, as the last of the bags is swallowed. Not real! Not real....! "Nothin'' at all, ''cept a treat in one hand.... and a whip in the other!" "Oh. Is that so....?" It whispers in the ravening black. ".....my sweet Monster?" And I let out the mewl of terror it wants to hear. "No.... Not again....." It''s not hard to beg. To act. To be the victim it''s looking for. To give in. "Please..... please not again....." "And what will you do to stop me!?" Moon laughs at me. Wild, and without reservation. Howling, with inky glee, as it pours faster. And faster. Devouring my claws. My hands. My feet. Wrapping my ankles. My tail. "No.... No! no! Nononononono-!!" I scream as the thing wraps my whole body. My arm clawing above the surface. Looking for a hold that doesn''t exist. The darkness sucking be down into a world of suffocating hands. "Do you know the most tricky trick?" It purrs, from every thrumming, undulating, direction as that half-a-face of gleaming silver smiles at me in the nothingness. Fingers of nothing jabbing my flesh from every angle. "The tricksiest trick.... that there ever, ever, was....?" I can only gag through gritted teeth, as the things in the dark try to peel open my mouth. To play with my tongue. top crawl down my throat and- "The bestest little trick....." It chuckles and sneers, leaning down and down. Close as skin. So close I feel it, like it''s right my head. "....is the one you fall for, no matter how well you know it....." I feel it touch me. All over. Invading my throat. My claws gripped so tight they bury in skin, and dig for the bone. Many vile mouths nibbling the fur of my ears and tail with rotten, spiking, teeth. My skin. My face. Hammering me with panic as I fight for a single breath. "Thank you. For your participation." Moon whispers at last, as I fight to hold on to that golden secret. To clutch it tight to my chest. "I think.... yes.... I think I have my little answer." It kisses my face with vile mouths. "And it''s exactly the one I wanted." The darkness invades my mind. And then it swallows me whole. >>><<< >> Paranoia Agent >> Paranoia Agent
## Connection :: [Stable] ## Medical Systems :: [Online] ## Diagnostic :: [ERROR]
Turmoil. Chaos. Darkness, and flashes of light. Voices. Shouting. Familiar? Family? I feel myself being dragged. I feel the rumble of the lift. The pacing of Demon, his claws clicking back and forth. Tail whisking my face. Then, I''m in the flat. Just there. As if time itself is stuttering. Or I am. I drift, there, in silence. Gone from the world, then back. Gone. And back. Gone..... A humming, shimmering, little bell rings in my head. Echoing across the vast nothingness. It flickers with light. And I reach out toward it. Is that the secret? My secret? I chase it into the dark. My hand reaching out. Closing on something..... Squishy.... Something.... Strange.... Something..... ....snotty? "YAHH! SPOOOK GOT MY FACE!" It wails. I give it another squish, for scientific reasons, and it makes similar noises. Hummm.... "Oi! Spook''s back!" Yells a spidery white-haired blur. Another, with horns, leaning down from the side as Kami shoves a white plastic ''gun'' in my face. I stare at the plastic ''beads'' on its nose, and blinding multi-coloured light stabs my eyes. I groan, horribly, flailing The Secret at it. This makes the noises a lot louder. Stupid secret! Why are you so noisy? You''re meant to be bloody quiet! I grab it with both hands and bring it to eye level. "Don''.... Don'' bloody tell no''body." I warn it, seriously. "Bo kay poook!" It gargles back. And I let the world go dark again, for a while. Sinking back into..... My eyes flip open again, and..... for some reason.... I''m hugging my helmet? The flat swims into focus, as I drop it off the side of the battered yellow sofa I call a bed. Groaning as I tilt my head up to survey the equally battered Sofa Nook. Dazed, and dizzy. Staring up at the orbs of flickering purple, green, and more that speed past my face. Drifting. Changing..... A standing lamp bends into spirals, and contortions, as the walls rise into towering arches of impossible height. Revealing a universe of bizarre and impossible colours and shapes. Of living sounds, and twisted planets. Our wrought-iron staircase unfurling into a flower of crazed metal that drifts away in an endless nebula of eyes. Fish woven from fine tongues of rainbow fire pouring in through the arches and doorways. Dancing above me. Merging. Splitting. And reforming. While all the time, a billion shadow-stuff butterflies pour from our kitchen. Dark as nightmares, and flecked with gold. Slowly, I turn. Still sat on the sofa. Aeons of time roaring around me, as the flat decays into nothing. Is rebuilt. And decays once more. Towers rising around it - graven, and strange, like the pillars of a fallen god. No. Not like. They actually are. I can see them. Mountain-high beings bound to titanic thrones by sharp wire and silvery chain. Crying tears of utter void as they stare off into an infinity I cannot comprehend. The towers of The City are their temples. And yet, they are its prisoners. Trapped beneath a sky of creatures no sane mind could comprehend. My brain boiling in my skull as I fight to shut eyes that WILL NOT close. I grab at my face, but my hands are wires and cables and blinking lights. So I shove my head into the cushions and scream. But theres an entire universe down there. A galaxy of- Spook! Mate! You okay!? A garbled voice yells, and I wrench my neck around. Staring up at the balcony above, which erupts into maddening spirals. The Games Nook a festival of blinding light as a being arises. A thing of ten thousand faces and hands, all strung together with screaming cables of rainbow light. It grips the melting rail, and bends right over it. Stretching down, and impossibly down, until one of its billion noses touches mine. A second monster exploding from the rooms, right behind him. A thing like a single, mile-long, arm that flails and slithers over everything. Chasing a fox with a hole through its heart, and a creature with gargantuan tusks. I scream. But the very words come alive, and blur away like bullets - into the distorted madness. Dragging me away, into dimensions too mad and twisted to be real. Hurling me toward a thousands freakish cubes, all made of of pure white petals. They pour up from the depths of infinity, in a roaring wash of ice-hot blue. Like a singular being built of many parts. Grinning without mouths. Staring without eyes. Licking without lips. Laughing a saw-blade scream of hunger as I begin to tip, and tumble, and fall towards it. Slamming my claws into a stream of colour as I howl, and haul myself back. But the things are coming THE THINGS. And they- If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. My eyes slam shut, and- I wake, again. Wedged between the coffee-table, and the sofa - right as my fallen helmet drives directly into my unarmoured stomach. Mashing breath from my lungs, like a hammer pulverising a whoopie cushion. And with approximately the same sound. I choke. I fall backward. And Tufty catches me. For a flickering instant I see a moon cut in half. A shadow. A nightmare. A demon. And then. between one blink and the next, the room is as it should be. The curtain-walls dropping. The monsters and nightmares shrinking away into nothing at all. I tear myself way from the fallen cat, and dive behind the sofa. Huffing. Panting. Choking. Clutching my head. My skull is exploding. It.... No. It isnt. But.... it feels like it should be. As if the pain is real, but it''s... it''s like it''s off in another dimension somewhere.....? But Im okay! Im .alive! Im. Mate! Mate, you okay?? Like, I heard. I stare up at him, and he''s..... normal. Gloriously, wonderfully, normal..... Gonna be fine. I grunt, at last. Just winded. Right. Right. He winces, trading looks with Kami. Like, are you sure though? I mean. We. like, we. Found you flat on your face in the warehouse. She drawls, stumping up behind me. We came back down. Door locked. Cake everywhere. You were screaming your damn head off. By the time we broke in, you were just. Out. I chance a glance up at her, too, and. Yeah. She''s not a weird monster. "Right......" Yeah! I mean, it was nuts mate! Like, we thought you were dead! Zip blurts in a rush. And you were, like, moaning and saying stuff, and like.. Drugged. Kami states, simply. "Or you ate something..... weird without scanning it." "Weird?" I wince. "Wacko monster spores, maybe." That. I hesitate. Thatd explain some of the craaaazy ass shit I was seein just now. Seeing!? Zip taps his piercing on his teeth. Mate. Like, shit. Whats going on with you today? Like.. I drag a breath. Moon. Moon is- Wait. My tail slashes air, and I flick a look upward. Right at the watching turret in the corner of the room. Then at the camera on the fridge. The other cameras dotted around. On guns. On armour. On us. And, suddenly, I realise what that eight minutes of missing video really means. And I remember the damn Secret. "I don''t think it''s drugs. Or spores." I whisper, shaking. "I think it''s bloody Moon. I think it''s making me see shit to scare me. Isolate me. It made me see Mother. It''s been making me hallucinate. I think it''s in our implants. Our base. And...." I look up at them, eyes blurring as I fight back tears. "I know what it''s up to. I know what its damn game plan is. And...." I swallow again. "...we have to stop it." "How?" "Not here." I snap, sudden energy blasting through me. "If Moon is a damn AI, its in our building systems! Polybius! I need this place bloody secure! Right now! Kill everythin with a microphone, or camera!! Right now! Spook? Mate? Zip hesitates. Do it! Quick! The tower computers, too! Everythin! Engaging digital quarantine mode. The machine states, and the power dies. Killing everything. But that''s only the start. Our guns. Our armour. Everything turns suddenly inert. And then even the darkness vanishes in a cascade of system errors, and text, as my Implants shut off. My eyes. My ears. Everything. I curse, but I barely feel the vibrations in my throat. Im deaf. Blind. I see nothing. Hear nothing. As if everything but me ceased to exist. No not quite. I can still breathe. Still smell the room, and everyone in it. The sweat. The rocket-smoke. The fear. I still feel the carpet on my toes, and the sofa clenched in one hand. Still sense the others by their heat and currents of air. My panic forced down, and swallowed, as I remind myself: I asked for this. That this is important. Even if its hard to bear, after Moons suffocating dark. Even if I start breathing harder. Harder. Gripping my fabric, as nothing happens. And still nothing. Until..
## NeoSoviet Battletek Implant v5.3.2 :: [Online] ## Startup Sequence :: [Aborted] ## Installing :: [Secondary Boot Sequence v0.2b]
It blinks in the dark for almost forever. And then.
## Boot Sequence :: [Activated] ## Startup Sequence :: [Secondary] ## Encrypted Uplink :: [Online] ## Low Power Mode :: [Activated] ## Core Systems :: [Limited] ## Secondary Systems :: [Deactivated] ## Sensor Systems :: [Deactivated] ## Encrypted Uplink :: [Activated]
Dots of bright, primary colour appear in the dark, sketching out wireframe lines. Nothing fancy. Just a trio of boxy sofas, a coffee-table, and a lamp hanging in absolute void. Right where they should be. Their surfaces gaining a mere sheen of substance. Just enough for your mind to fill in the details. And then we appear. Jagged. Colourful. Built of cubes and triangles, but clearly us. Dang. Weve gone. budget mode? The void swallows words even I am deaf to, as if they never existed at all. Its too much like what Moon did to me. Too soon. It reminds me of the twisted vision. I shut my eyes, which doesnt do a damn thing to what I can see. The silence enduring, endlessly, until-
## Keyboard :: [Activated]
-a mass of scrambled letters and numbers appear in mid-air. Slowly drifting, and shifting in every direction. Flipping positions, the instant they touch. Polybius appears in the dark as a mess of archaic digital noise. All hideous purple and green. Welcome to The Vault. It states, in a violent buzz of digital noise. All systems are now under my control. It reverberates. All optics, microphones, and sensors have been shut down. A low click, in the dark. Beyond the void. Everything you see and hear is now generated within me. I hurl my legs over the virtual sofa, and land on soft material in a coiling crouch. Two worlds, merging, as neon outlines glitch against the void. "Let''s do this." >>><<< >> Secrets In The Dark >> Secrets In The Dark
## neuroLink :: [Stable]
You may now speak. Echoes an ominous voice, from nowhere at all, as numbers and letters dance before my eyes. Shifting. Twitching. Filled with possibilities. Right. Are we ready? I say, but there''s no sound. Nothing. Just the dead vibration in my throat. And not even Polybius can hear me. I slap myself, and jab at the floating keys instead. "Right. Lets. Go.." Buzzes a freaky metallic voice that sounds just like me. "Okay. Weird." What. Is. This. Funky. Bullshit. Kami stutters, next, as the jagged outlines of my friends shuffle in around me. Every word hammered out in a staccato beat. Followed by a synthetic, blocky, Badger yelling BRUTAL. I''M. A. ROBOT. "I have shut down all systems a rogue AI would require to function." Polybius explains in its own, jarring, voice. "The world you now see is generated entirely within my own Cores. Lol. Your. Graphics. Suck. Says cubist Zipper. Apologies. The thing ticks at him with almost reproach. This system was built to require only most primitive layers of technology, enabling my near-total shutdown. You shut yourself down? I repeat. Then curse, silently, and type it out on the keyboard. Correct. It clicks. The existence of a malicious AI is now a high probability. However; we have yet to determine its location. It is likely attached to your implants. Perhaps, to subsystems of The Night Tyrant, or the building computers. The machine mind almost seems to hesitate. There is also a fractional possibility that it has infected my own Cores. Our avatars twist blocky heads, as if sharing a glance. I swallow, and vault my way onto the sofa. Coiling in a way that makes it glitch. Is. That. Possible. Kami asks. Unknown. It jutters. The AI is entirely hypothetical. With unknown capabilities. We cannot know if it is centralised, remote, or fragmentary. It may have invaded any number of systems. Drones. Weapons modules. Operating systems. Polybius Cores. Or any number of other options. The machine goes silent. A little too suddenly. Like. What. Kamis avatar stutters. The Machine Mind remains quiet for a little too long. But then, it speaks. The False Moon AI may have been inserted directly into your brains." The silence is long. And horrified. "Our. Brains." I type. "There are numerous possibilities. Neural Encoding. Hidden Implants. nanoTek. Hijack Worms. Artificially engineered cells inserted directly into flesh." The thing indicates. "All can be used to encode an AI on living tissue. We all stare at it. Then at each other. At least, as much we can while made of glowing lines. "Jesus." I breathe, out loud. Cheerful bloody thoughts, right? And, without warning, the world jitters.
## The Vault :: [Update Installed]
They can really do that shit? Kami types, and the words flow more naturally. Almost like she spoke them. "Stick an AI into our brains?" Correct. Polybius flickers, and the blocky image of a cell appears beside it. Carved from horrible purple and green. Living cells are considered a form of nanoTek. They can be programmed to do anything that nanoTek can. Additionally; they are far harder to detect. It hesitates again. They can also be programmed to mutate, mind-control, or destroy their host. And The Vault will not stop them from spying on you. Shit. Say several of the avatars. "Maybe we''re all the traitor." Zipper adds. And I feel the jolt of uncertainty spike through the room. Do not despair. The machine states. As if simply saying it will make us not despair. Easy for you. Kami retorts. Our text flowing faster as a wave of names and common words spiral out to circle the keyboard. I tap enter. Any of that likely? Unknown. The thing says, repeating its new favourite word. Corporate Citizens, geneFreaks, Soldiers, slaves, GMOs, and plague weapons are all created by this form of bioHacking. Racist BS. Kami states. We dont know where GMOs came from. Not originally. Polybius turns to her, endless and calm. However, new GMOs are normally made via this method. Can I has some!? Badgers robo-voice yells, his blocky avatar flailing about. A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. I am specifically banned from giving you bioweapons. Polybius informs the digitised dork. Saving me the trouble. SAD EMOJI. States a cold, monotone, voice. Forget it. I interrupt, abandoning all preamble. This shit ain''t why we''re here." "Then what?" I lean forward. "I know Moons real game plan. Stop. Kamis avatar interrupts. Badger tells Tufty everything. Badger was included as a diversion. Polybius states. One of my Cores is feeding him a distorted version of this conversation. Moon will hear only what we wish. "Tufty? He is okay?" Demon''s voice says. Jagged, triangular, horns twisting as he peers around us. "I am keeping him occupied and observed." Good. I type. Cause shit about to get real. How real? Kami, again. I take a deep breath, and type furiously. Very. We knew we we''re being played. More than usual. They all lean in. "I''ve worked out how, and why." What? Zip taps. Hatred. I hammer back. It wants us bloody hate it. As much as possible. Wait. Not fear? Kami gestures. No. Not fear. I claw-stab letters. Fear dont work. Fear dont make us do the one damn thing it needs us to. I glance round at them. Moon needs us to do 2 things. I lick my lips. Flexing fingers. Now or never. I just gotta trust Pol''s crazy security. Thing one: It needs us to grab The Left Hand of The Devil. Kami leans back. Called it. Bastard just wants the toy. Two. I slam out. It needs us to try and kill Moon. The room goes still. And then fingers blur. What!? Mate!? Zips slams out. Killing Moons our bloody plan! No shit. I fire back. Moon has been playing us backwards. I thought it wanted us scared." My hands are shaking so bad I can barely hit the shifting keys. But it knew. I rip at the sofa, and punch it. It Goddamn knew. Knew what? Spook? Kamis robo-voice drones. But I feel the concern vibrating the air. "Fear ain''t enough." I type. Slowly. "The real, actual, Moon.... it''s trapped in the ONE place we can never, ever, go. Never. Never. Not as long as we live. Not for anything." Nobody has to say The School. We''re all too busy thinking it. It knew we''d never bloody rescue it. I continue. Almost whispering the words, though keep my lips tight. Why would we? Its a bloody monster. It tortured us. Killed our friends. I swallow, hard, even though my voice is useless here. And it knows. were afraid of That Place. A long silence. Cold, and dark. Yeah, mate. God. I get nightmares. Zips jagged legs retract into a huddle. No escape. Plan failing. And..... Kami and Demon say nothing. Loudly. Going back''s suicide. I tap out, building the crescendo. We know it. Moon bloody knows it. Even if we bloody wanted to rescue it, we couldn''t." "And we bloody don''t." Kami states, and I sense a snarl behind the bland monotone. So whats the next best thing?" I finish. "What''s Moon gonna expect, if we show up with a superweapon? Vengeance. Demons virtual horns snap to face me. Murder rampage. Kami corrects. Both. I agree. Best chance its got, though. Ain''t it?" I raise a hand, let it fall. "But it knows we ain''t gonna try it. Not really. We floated killing Moon, but we didnt bloody mean it." "Barely got out. Zip types. "Barely." I start shaking. Clenching claws, tight. Even had a damned superweapon. Just like The Left Hand. And it didn''t mean anythin''. Not against..... I can''t finish. Even typing, the words won''t come out. Tactically, it would be suicide. A flickering image of a ruby handgun appears next to Polybius. The Red Right Hand was not capable of erasing the entire neoSoviet armada. It is doubtful the Left would fare better. Damn straight." My monotone robo-voice states. "Wed have grabbed it, and left Moon to swing. No question. Damn right. Kamis virtual voice has a snarl to it. Gaining more emotion as a second update hits. Right at the last second. Right before it could screw us. And it bloody knows that. The School. I fear more than Moon''s shadow. Demon adds, jerkily, as cold shakes go up my back. I want to correct him but no. No. Hes right. This AI, or whatever it is, is a damn cupcake compared to We cant ever go back. My metal voice whispers, as I rip at the real sofa in the real world. Doing nothing to its digital clone. Moon knew it. I slash down the fabric. It bloody knew. So? Kami prompts, as the dark around us glitches with eerie colour. Almost like its listening. But we all know what I''m going to say. They''re working it out. "So...." I repeat, typing so slow the words falter. "Moon has to kill one of us." "One." Kami states. That one, robotic, word stripped of all the boiling emotion I feel behind it. "At first." I tap. "It doesn''t matter who. As long as it''s not....." I stop myself. Even in here, I can''t say it. "...too many of us. Enough to drive us into a vengeance fury. Make us fight the other Omega Teams for bits of The Hand, so we can kill it. Or defend against it. Or whatever." "Then what?" She asks, when I go quiet. "Soon as we have The Hand, it kills all of us." I shudder. "You. Badger. Tufty. Demon. Zip. All of us." I somehow hit the final key, and press enter. "Except one." "Mate. All of us? Serious?" "Yes." The typed word is so flat. So free of the fury inside me. I wonder where Pol recorded it. Me ordering coffee? Or telling Badger he can have a treat? Or.... "For Moon''s plan to work...." I continue. "It needs suicidal hatred. Hatred with nothing to lose...." I swallow, and it hurts. "Nothing." My fist passes through the keys. "Nothing at all." My claws grip chest. As if I can feel the spores of that Wrath inside me. Ready to grow. To be born. Titanic, and ancient, and primordial. Pure and without restraint. Raw, and wild. As the first scream against the first, bitter, sky. Hatred. HATRED. HATRED of such power that fear is nothing. Life is nothing. Death is NOTHING. Sheer. Unfathomable. Endless. HATE. "So much hate..... I''m willing to do Goddamned anythin'' to get at Moon. Because that.... is the only way...." I choke at my own, monotone, voice. Even as I fight to type. "The only way......" The only way to make me hunt down some kind of insane, nightmare, superweapon from an ancient and forgotten age. A thing best left buried as deep as it will go. A thing brim-full of pox, and Hellfire, and murder as wild as Armageddon itself..... A thing that may have caused The End Of Days..... A thing just like the one Moon dangled in front of my face...... The Left Hand Of The Devil. "The only way to make one of us..... Whoever survives...." me. It has to be me "....openly attack the one bloody place we can never, ever, ever go." To fight my way inside The School. Killing. Maiming. Burning the whole world. "Is to kill every other bloody one of us." And I know. I know I would go. For Badger. Tufty. Zipper. Demon.... Gremlin.... Even Polybius. We all know I would. And I would burn my way in. Through the armies. The Nightmare machines. And.... ...I would never be enough. I would fall. Battered. Bloodied. Already dying. And then. Just, as I''m bleeding out..... I would hear a slow, inevitable, clap..... "And Moon would use your invasion to steal, from you, The Left Hand Of The Devil." Polybius finishes. "Joining it with The Red Right Hand." And what abomination would that make? If it were whole. Right, and Left, united as one..... With unseen tears, I stare up into the void. My blind eyes clamped, hard shut. Though it does nothing to disrupt the images fed directly into my brain. And I whisper one word. "Yes....." As I imagine the shadow of Moon''s mask, looming form the void. Its half-skull face twisting with joy, and glee, and hideous contempt. And. In my mind.... ....or maybe, for real.... ....or maybe, both.... Whispering words of death and glee. And my eyes, slowly, harden. My rage blooming like fire from a gutted tower. Because Moon was right. Moon was absolutely Goddamned right. The best trick in the world.... ...is the one you fall for, even when you know how it works. "I.... will.... kill.... you.... Moon." I whisper, to the blind dark. "And. It. Will. Hurt." >>><<< >> Liars In The Dark >> Liars In The Dark Ten minutes later So. Kill this False Moon AI thing, and were free. Kami says, as I pace the dark behind the sofa. The keyboards gone. The jagged 3D suddenly slick and refined. The Vault has changed. I shiver as I turn to her. Willing my words to Polybius, via my defunct Brainwashing Implant. Can we even do that? My voice echoes in the shadow-space, and the others look up. In theory, it is a simple task. Polybius states. Its form burning above us. A layered infinity of chaos and order. Eradicate all electrical systems. Wipe everything? She shivers. Start again? Yes. The thing shimmers and twists in serpentine patterns. Shattering into triangles and numbers. All data would be destroyed. Everything. All weapons, vehicles, armour, and life-support would become inoperative. I would need to manually recreate all systems. This is not optimal. Shit! And my games! Zip yelps, clearly focused on Priority One. Like, damn right thats not op- And that would kill Fake Moon? For sure? No. But it is highly probable, based on current assumptions. The Machine Mind glitches. A viral AI is pure data. Memory. And nothing else. Eliminate the data, and you eliminate the AI. It clicks for a second. However. There is no guarantee of full elimination. The tower systems are old. Convoluted. There are likely places it could hide. Okay. EMP that shit. I snap. Plausible. But dangerous. The tower itself is infested. But its systems are what contain that infection. Destroy them, and the electronic doors will fail. It ticks for a second. However. Other options are available. Like what? Unleash a new AI virus bred, specifically, to locate and assassinate False Moon. The Vault stills, as we consider this. And thatll work? My head tilts. Ears peaked, though it makes no deference. Not in here, with every signal routed directly to my brain. False Moon is at a disadvantage. Polybius continues, as if thinking aloud. It is likely Moon, itself, never accounted for my existence. Therefore - the thing we face is likely a standard neoSoviet AI Infiltrator. A simple AI Virus loaded with Moons personality profile. What is zis? Demon inquires, tail lashing the edge of the sofa. The neoSoviet Infiltrator is a known quantity. An AI designed for assassination, terrorism, social media manipulation, harassment, and political subterfuge. Explains the thing above us. With its own identifiable signature, files, and methods. The payload is likely nothing more than an AI loaded with Moon''s Personality Profile. "An AI inside an AI?" I blink. Wait. So the Moon part ain''t in control!? Unknown. Polybius intones, darkly. We are forced to speculate. However. If it is an AI, this is likely how it would be done: an Infiltrator System using your enemy as a puppet. Damn. Couldve bloody fooled me. I hiss. Yes. Our own AI states. It is designed to. The room goes quiet. Thoughtful. "Can this damn thing really kill us? Kamis avatar almost scowls. It had a damn good bloody go. I project in a rage, and the words erupt from thin air with perfect clarity. Stuck its-" I choke off the thought. "And- And it- I merely whisper clutching my mouth. Shuddering, as images scar into my memory. This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. Moons fingers wiggling down in my throat.. Hey, mate.... You okay?" Silence. "Like, uh.... take your time? Yeah? Zip seems to swallow. Like, Moon aint been gentle with any of us. Yknow? We all been there. And the words slip free. In my mouth.. Choking. Fingers. Reachin down I breathe, out loud. Where nobody can hear. Eyes flickering. Haunted. Almost like it was reachin for.. I ram the thought aside, and focus. Projecting a nice, warm, lie to the group. Yeah. No. Not a big deal. Damn right. Kami fibs back. Omega Zero dont give a shit. Were too bloody tough. Zha. Demon lies, as well. One virtual hand resting on a lump of nothingness, just above his knee. Pain is nothing. Victory is all. Yeah. I look away. But what if.. Spook. Polybius interjects. Your interactions with False Moon- No. I snap. I cant. I- My lips whisper, as I draw hard breaths. And I force my mind to send them casual words It aint nothing. Explaining what you saw would give us context and insight into its capabilities. The machine continues, in endless calm. You got video. You tell me. I would have stuttered, if my voice was real. But instead, it comes out cool and calm. Artificially so. The video is the quandary, Polybius states. that I wish to solve. Well. That werent creepy. I look away. Sigh. Gird myself. And... When I start to remember. To tell them. It floods out in a wild storm. It floods from me. And, though I leave out most of the grim details, they recoil from it. Shivering. Reminded of their own hideous past. A time when Moon smiled its happy smile at us every single day..... .but Ive been choked out before." I finish. "It weren''t like that at all. Recovery was all wrong. Id be bloody out of it. For a while. And well, yknow. Interesting. Polybius notes. As if we were prattling on about the weather. Your vitals at the time of The Event indicate high stress. Moderate activity. But not asphyxia. Zips digital head tilts. Whats that mean mate? Means it was a bloody illusion. Kami slams a soundless fist on the arm of her sofa. Lies. All of it. I wince, and curl my legs inward. Felt bloody real at the time.. Illusions are often more dangerous than what they conceal, because they conceal it. Polybius says, its voice empty of reassurance. Guess so, mate. Zip shrugs. Like, if it made you think air is food. And you, like, ate it til you starved." Or walked you off a cliff. Kami butts in. Or you could just be sitting in here, and it could make us think acid is cola. Or grenades are toys. I add, with a glance at Badgers excitable avatar. But he never reacts, and I shake my head. No. I dont bloody accept that Moon can just- Spook. If its reality- Kami says. No. I growl, slamming the thought through our weird connection. Fake Moon tried to kill us twice. Both times, it was the same trick. Line us up. Make us shoot eachother. And I think.... I stare round at em. "....I think it can''t. I think it''s all in our heads. The whole thing. And all it can do is make us see shit." "A plausible hypothesis." The Machine Mind rumbles in the dark above, like living thunder. "However. There is a complication." A video appears in midair. It''s the warehouse. A view from the ceiling. Im alone, at the door. Talking to whatever was out there. And then- A flicker in the feed. And suddenly my head is locked to the metal. Another jerk, a the video blacks out. Totally. The perspective flipping to my eyes, and cutting randomly. Dark, and not. Jumping, abruptly, to the instant I see my own helmet clatter to the floor. "Moon." My past-self whispers, and the image stutters black. Jerking from moment to moment. Each one chosen, as if at random. Me ducking from nothing. Me backing toward the door. And then it all goes utterly dark. As if swallowed by the depths of an inky-black ocean. "Shit, what.... what was that?" Kami hesitates. "That... why''s it cut like that??" Inconclusive. The Machine intones, as the few frames we have splay into a wall. Filled in by a few other angles. A few other moments. Me shouting. Me dodging I dunno what. Running to the door. Aiming at the door - with all my friends on the other side. Then, finally, the video kicks back in. Me on the floor, shaking. Going utterly still, except for my breath. Eyes locked in a terrified stare at utter infinity. A few moments later, my team bust in. Guns ready. Jumping my helmet, like it might be a bomb, as they fan out to sweep the room. Demon dropping to check my limp body, then scoop it and run. Finally, they return to stare at my helmet. And the forgotten tool. Eight minutes. Again. I whisper. Your prior encounter with Moon is extremely similar to this. Polybius crackles in the void above. Video appears to cut before the encounter, then stutters in and out. Reviling nothing. What.. Kami barges up to the images. But its Demon, of all people, who voices the thought she left hanging in the air. Deleted video. It does not stutter. I nod, slowly. That aint like a normal wipe. Normal wipes are clean. I project to the others. Itd just be bloody gone.. My claws grasp at the air, like the answer is right there. Its almost. Almost like it shuts off the feed whenever it catches Moon. Almost.. .almost like Moon was actually there. Hidden between the frames. Polybius. Kami says, at last. What are the odds on it having an accomplice? > > >< < < >> Brave Fools >> Brave Fools
## Program Shutdown :: [The Vault]
"Woo! Yeah! And they TOTALLY listened to ALL MY SUPER AWESOME IDEAS!!! It was totally amaze-balls!" Badger yells, swinging Tufty about like a doll. "Totally, lil mate." Zip teases. And! And! And!! Badger bubbles, hoping and skipping and whirling his friend about. And Kami said I was super smart! And- We all turn away, and snort. Demon knocking my arm with his knuckles, and smiling. Zis.. Will it be backfiring? He says. And I give him my best ho boy, where do I start? look as Badger launches into a giddy, maniacal, rant about his super-secret master plan. Guess well see. I grin, then tilt an eye up at him. Mean time, you doin okay? Demon blinks, slowly. Me? I am fine. His eyes flicker away. Zis. it is nothing. Dont sound like nothin.... You still hurt? I frown, and he winces. Lashing my leg with that leonine tail as he turns. Nothing. It is nothing. My lips tighten. As he walks away. He is lying. He almost died during the night. Intones the jagged machine of gears and numbers behind me. What. My head snaps toward it. WHAT. I turn. But Polybius is already gone. Leaving me blinking at Zipper - currently locked in a sword-fight with Badger and Tufty. (Which. seems to be part of the explanation?) I shake my head, eyes tracking up to Kami - also in front of me - who snarls and beats on our clunky old 3D Printer. Does. Polybius want me to talk to them? Well. I need to anyway. Zip and Gremlin blast overhead as I sidle up to Kami. "Five." she growls. "Five! Come on! FOUR! You can bloody do it!" She raps the countdown on the Printer''s bulky yellow pod, and it jitters horribly. "RRGH! COME ON! Just-" The thing jams on ''three'' - and she kicks it, mercilessly, until it resumes. Finally letting out a long, tremulous, beep before stuttering to a stop. The hatch instantly pounced upon by the metal-armed spider-lady - who terrorises the thing until it gives up her prize. Plus a massive stink of hot plastic. "New guns?" I wince. Cant beat home cooked. She grins at me, lifting a pair of brand new, steaming hot, LMG Executioner pistols. 10mm. Rocket-rail. Titanium frame version. Overclocked, for high impact delivery. Plus upgraded capacitors, so they wont burn out as quick. Like the last ones? I prod, drily. Too bloody right. She smirks at me, flicking the weapons up into the air - where the inky finish gleams with inlaid lines of dark pink Almost imagery. She snatches both, and her extra arms slam fresh mags right up in there. They lock in place as the internals whirr. Been itching to print these. She grins at me, with devilish fire. The guns they pretend were issued. Not the stripped-down knockoffs we actually got. They being the neoSoviet Empire. Yeah. I hesitate. Hey. Kam. Last night, did- Hey. Niiiice. That art on em? Zipper erupts over my shoulder. Dodging around me to peer at her guns. Like - real, real, faint? Nose out, blue-bollocks. Our [Sniper] growls. Slapping his hands half-off as she slots the new pistols onto her thighs. Dark bluish armour locking them in place, nestled amongst the thread of gold circuitry. And eyes. Brassy, and sealed shut. Mate! Hey, like cmon! Now I gotta see! He cheers. Balancing precariously on his heels as he leans right in, with thumbs stuffed deep in the pockets of his jeans. Bet its, like, all pretty pink ponies in tactical vests? Right? And- Kamis eyes boil with death and carnage. Im going to insert that console right up your- Ah. Yeah. Alright, mate! Zip rolls back up, shrugging widely. But, hey, like now I gotta find out! Yknow that righ-? Kami snatches up an empty reel of plastic Printer wire, and yeets it at his head. Forcing Zip to dip aside. Woah! He yelps, as she follows up with a trio of titanium powder pods that blast past my nose like missiles. But this aint like last time. On the Night Tyrant, she was a six-armed brawler dominating a narrow rear compartment. Packing him in with low ceiling, and narrow walls. Now? Shes a thundering, top-heavy, train-wreck skating on slick plastic wrappers. Forced to chuck whatever she can while Zipper, well, zips clear out of the way. Bounding from chairtop, to table, and back like a GMO. Utterly untouchable. FINE! She roars. DONT GET MURDERED! SEE IF I CARE!! And then she stomps back to the printer. Jamming buttons, and muttering, until the tiny arms inside click and jerk into tremulous motion. Unpacking gears and wire, as the micro-welders burn white-hot - laying down the frames of two more guns. You n your pistol addiction. I snort, and she slams her hands down. Taking a long, steadying, breath. Yeah. I got a real problem. Right ya do. My lip twitches. Our silence spinning out into a a savage morass, littered by the corpses of our conversation. Look. Kami. Did. Did I use all the titanium powder? She rounds on me, with an overly dramatic stomp. Yes! Yes, I did! I need guns. Alright? I know I bloody get through them, but- Kami- Her hands rise to stop me, and she does some sort of Tai Chi breathing thing. A girls gotta shoot things. Y''know? She drawls, in a calmer tone. Flicking back to the glitching, stuttering, old-school screen. The kind made of actual, physical, plastic - not virtual reality. And Zipper has a whole damn swarm of guns now anyways. And a mini tank. He can wait for his tiny bloody missiles. And we STILL don''t have that hand blueprint for Badger. "I''M OKAY!!" Badger yells, with a huge-handed wave that clocks him right in the skull. "THAT AIN''T WHAT THE SHRINK SAID!" I yell back, making Kami snort. But I turn to her . It aint about that.. The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. She blinks. Put out. Its not? Nope. I glance down. "Though. Material pods are pretty low.." Look. Alright. Sorry. Been. Ive been stressed out lately. She grumbles, itching the scared flesh between the joints of her cyberarms. Got a lot to think about. Been driving me nuts. She tails off. Almost like she wants me to ask. But I remember why I scurried on over. And I trample the urge to oblige - guilty feelings or no. Did Demon. nearly die last night? Her hands jerk. What. She shivers, then looks away. Zipper? Nope. Polybius. Shit. She growls. I cant punch Polybius. My head tilts, one ear up. So.... What the bloody Hell happened? Blood. She mutters. Blood is bloody right. Kami. Please. No code of silence shit. Not with me. Its not like that. Her many fingers pause, their tapping quiet. Spook. Look. Youre. Youre up to your neck with Moon. Carrying a whole damn team on your back. And sometimes. She stutters, and her head drops. .its best if you just dont know. The shit it is. You could get us killed. I jab her right in the face with my claw. You saw him training today. What if I called a mission, right now? Thinkin he was all good? Its a mark or my position that Kami backs off. Sorry. She grits. Yshould be. Every bust lip and boo-boo is my business. I jab again. Now. Tell me. Whats this shit about Demon dying? He can hear us- How hurt? Hurt. She states. Face twisted through a rictus mass of expression. Her stony-white eyes twisted toward the others. But, after a second, she relents - flicking a hand to mute the zone around us. Alright.,,,, He got torn up. Really bad. Nearly bled out on the way back. I was watching his vitals. And I wasnt. Shit. My own lip twists, and I stare at the machine. "Knew he got hit, but." Its worse than you saw. She carries on. Both of us ignoring the horned figure dragging itself up the stairs. Worse? Wayman. you know how they flipped to lethal ammo, right near the end? Or started to. Kami answers. Softly. Not quick enough to stop us. But. But. But Demon took out half their ground force on his own. And I nuked their Carriers. She leans against the wall. They didnt like that. Tried to nail him. And me. But I had a big brick wall. Stealth. Holes to hide in. And Demon didnt. Jesus. He tried to cover it. She finishes, eyes on the ceiling. But I saw.... He was dripping blood and adrenaline all the way back. Drained his suit''s mediPacks bone dry. Synthetic blood. Painkillers. Flesh nanites. everything. Like trying to fill a drainpipe. And Demons [Berserker] suit packs twice as much as mine. Holy shit.. I smelt it, but. But we were all bloody. All tired. All desperate to get back. And the rain. And the other smells. And I just wanted to sleep. And Demons a tough bastard. And he was bandaging himself up fine. And. And so many other excuses. I swallow. How close. dya think? Close enough. She retorts. His back''s a mess. Whole upper body, really.. Armour fractured, internally, and cut him up bad. Hes lucky his is extra thick. If he was in mine. Or yours. Dead.. He barely made it back to the ship. Spook. Kami finishes. Carrying Tufty, part of it. Loaded himself up on more synthetic blood, and dropped flat out. Then. She stares holes in nothing. He nearly bled out in the night.. I finish. Holy shit. Synthetic blood doesnt clot. Did you know that? She states, voice dead. Not the crappy neoSoviet shit we have, at any rate. And it doesnt matter, usually.. Not unless you lose a lot of it. I finish. From a whole lotta holes. Heard it called the sleeper reaper. Kami says. You get patched up. Youre fine. But you got too much synth in you, and it just. leaks. Kami.. I whisper. But she isnt done. Polybius woke us up. Said something was wrong with you. and Demon. But Demon. She cant look at me. He was bad. Real bad. Me and Zip had to. We had to glue him shut. And watch him. In shifts. A deep breath as she twists her hair. Thats why we didnt fight your little nap. Sorry. Oh. Yeah. And thats why we didnt tell you. Because you actually bloody care. I mutter. Too low for her to hear. But out loud, I curse. God. If any of you die, its my fault. My orders. My- Spook. Shut up. Seriously. Kami says, with all kindness. You know you cant control shit you cant control. So just deal with what you can. Alright? I blow breath through fangs. Very Zen. She stares off at not a lot, for a while. But theres something eating her. Something deep. Dark. And scary. But she shakes it off. Spook. Look, Im sorry. Im hard on people. Im a bitch. A bad friend, honestly. And I cant- Titanium fingers twist. I just- The rage. You- Could tell me bout it. But our [Sniper] sighs. No. No. I just got done heaping crap on you. You dont need my drama on top of that. Not when were already so beaten over. Her head shakes. Lets maybe lighten the mood, alright? Sure. But. what about you? What? Youre hurt too. Right? She scoffs. Ribs are bruised. Big deal. Demons the one you should go help. Acting like some big dang hero. A hand flicks, as if to knock the topic aside. Anyway. We have to talk to him about that. But thats not even our main problem. Supplies. I nod, slapping the Printer. Which goes ''skreee!''. Damn right. She grunts. Wayman hit us hard. But they hit our kit harder. She takes a breath. Much harder. Uh. How hard, exact- Bad. She gestures at the Printer. Forget the pistols, even. Zips too giddy about the Carrier to have noticed, but his jet force is dead. Blown to bits, mostly. He salvaged a couple. Sure. And the Carrier is awesome. She concedes. But his new airforce is, basically, package drones with worse guns. She starts pacing, back and forth in front of the printer. It gets worse, too. Im shit out of big girl ammo. For ya rifle? I wince. Crap. Youre damn right, crap. She tosses back her braids, and scowls. Ive got eight big dumb kinetic rounds, but thats it. No plasma. No armour piercing. No explosive. Guided. EMP. Nothing. And that''s just me, on my own. We''re in a bad way here. Well. shit. Thought we had a backstock? We did. She shrugs. But weve been burning ammo like crazy. Wayman this week. That Pirate war last. The week before- Well. We both wince. Weve got pistol ammo coming out our ass, at least. She finishes, patting her pistols. Three bricks, and change. Zips new drones are gonna snaff that. And the change. Kami blinks. Oh. Shit. Youre right. Three hundred rounds. Thirty rounds per bot. Thats ten bots.... And how many''s he got now? Forty? Fifty? Craaap. I lean on the printer, which makes weird noises until I stop. And he bust his whole stock of micro-missiles. Didnt he? Hes got a few in his room, but nothing like enough. She concedes. If those Wayman turds hit us again. My ears flatten. No ta. Better tell them that. She grumbles. Glaring at the printer, like it questioned her gun-art. Grenades are low, too. Except for flashers. Weve got billions of those. Zip wants to try recreating that airstrike thing they did. Oh, I bet.." My head dips. "Im gonna wake up with em all over me. Arent I? Depends how much rifle food I get. Kami says. Sweet as sugar-lead. I blink. Rifle what now? Big Betty is a hungry girl. She half-teases, in a wrung-out little voice. Then sighs, rubbing her face. "Well. I''m tying. I really am. But you kinda ruined my good mood back there." "That." I say, very slowly. "Was a good mood?" She grins, painfully. "Little bit. Now - are we gonna feed my beast, here, or am I gonna need to get creative?" "Yeaargh. S''long as you never, ever, call it that again." I grumble. Tapping claws on the printers screen to add a small block of her speciality rifle ammo to the order. The machines wails gaining a desperate tone as it lays out a series of white disks beside the guns. Half guided explosive. Half explosive." I say as it begins to build a dozen tiny rocket-engines. "But forget having six pistols, and dont blame me if they dont bloody finish. She flicks my ear. Hey- No plasma? Good bloody luck. We don''t got the cores. I growl, claw-poking her nose. Youre lucky Zip made out like a bandit, or hed be pis- Hey! C''mon!! She flips me a rambunctious six arm-shove. Dont make me beat em out of you! I jerk back. Yeesh. I- Her face falls. Oh. Right. I actually do that." She sags. "Sorry. Was.... just trying to lighten the mood.... Oooh! Can we help!? Badger whoops, waving a frisky Gremlin over his head. I toss a pillow. Nope! So, git! Aw! But I was just gonna-! He mimes tossing Gremlin - who swipes the air excitably, making cute lil murdery noises. Oh, you were? Were you? Kami purrs. Go on! Do it! Ill shove you so far up your own butt your head pops out your mouth! Yah! You can DO THAT!? Yep! She grins, wiggling thirty metal fingers. "Or maybe I''ll TICKLE YOU!" "YAHAHA!!!! RUN!!" He squeals - and they scamper, quick. I snort. Thought ya muted us. I did. She shrugs back. I think Badger is leaning to lip-read. Seriously?? My head spins to the dork in question. Dang. If he werent an idiot, hed be a genius. Thats how that works. Yeah. But the light of forced amusement leaves her eyes, once more. Spook. If our next job doesnt pay materials upfront, were toast." "Yeah. I know." I turn to her. "Its time." "Time?" A shimmer in the air, and I conjure a map of The Pirate Enclave. A single, bright, dot shining in the deeps. "To go find The Left Hand Of The Devil....." I turn to them, fire in my eyes. "Looks like we''re gonna need that intel Moon stuck us with...." > > >< < < >> Intel Retrieval Team >> Intel Retrieval Team Dust blooms in gentle waves as we enter the dead apartment. Breathers rasping as things with brilliant red spots flee for the corners. The wrought-iron stairs a jagged, imploded, mess. The ceiling cracked and scarred with blood. Metal staircase swooping down. Sofa discarded where it fell, so long ago. Grey with dust. Looks just like ours. But cleaner. A dot targets our hidden data stash, and I slip over to the dead kitchen. Claw tapping along cupboards until I find the one we didnt rig to explode. Slowly, I ease it open. Unhooking a thin wire from the door, before swinging it wide to extract the shielded container within. I rip it open, and scan it quickly. Still dead? A glance up at Zipper. A nod. And I tip out the container. Revealing the gleaming dataStick inside. Half silver, half gleaming black. Etched with the leering face of Moon. Mate. Were taking, like, a serious risk here. Zip whispers in the endless silence and death. Staring at the twisted skull laid out on the cheery tiled surface. Five, glaring, eye-sockets crawling with nameless... unthinkable.... darkness. Its in our systems. I breathe, in that hesitant instant. Yeah. Zip says. His stare fixated. But, yknow, like, I.... I mean He swallows. Mate, I still get nightmares bout The Red Right Hand. Like. Do we really gotta- And I see it again, in a terrible flash. RED. BURNING RED. INCANDESENT. GLORIOUS. PURGE THE- Watch the room. My hand shakes as I scan the dataStick again. This time, with the scanner Kami lent me. Right. Right. He tears his eyes from the skull. But, mate. we still got options here. Yknow? We dont gotta side with Moon- We aint sidin with nobody. I flick the dataStick back into its container. Hesitate. Then drop it out, and scan it again. This is us fighting Moon. I add, because Moon wants to hear it. We get hold of this Hand thing, we got options. It puts us level with the damn thing. And buys Pol time to delete the real threat. Right! Yeah! But, yknow, like.... first time we whip it out, people are gonna know we have it? I know. But, hey, we don''t gotta play Moon''s game!" He almost gushes in hope. "We got mad sellables here? Right? All kinds of old tek in this tower! I mean look! He slaps a hand on the stove, which roars with rings of sudden light. Tiny metallic arms rising - ready to cook. Zipper. Monsters. In this room. Right. He shuts it off, with the sweep of a finger. Voice dipping to near silence - carried only by his comms. But, I mean, cmon! Pack it up, mate! Sell it! He beams over his shoulder at me. I mean, like, weve done it before! And, sure, we didnt get much. but. But Wayman. The Pirates, too. I shake my head. And whatever freaks our The School is doling out to chase us. Claws slip as I seal the dataStick in its container. Sorry. Cant risk sneakin into The Towers right now, Blue. Not the way we are. Not luggin a buncha big ole cookers thatll sell for ten Blood a pop. Yeah... mate, like I get it.... But Y''know.... He whispers. Y''know there''s gotta be another way. Right? I mean.... The Hand is in under the towers. Down in The Old City. Do we even know whats down there? That which slumbers in the dark. Dreaming of humanity. Polybius whispers back, sending feverish shivers up my back. But Zip doesnt react. Like he never even heard. Silence bores deep, and I stare up at him. "No." I murmur. And shiver. Nothin good, at any rate. The dataStick glimmers with deadly intent as I lift it, fingers quaking. But thats what were here for. To see if Moon left us any hints.. G-guess so. He shivers. But, mate. Its creeping me out. Seeing that thing again. If you use it. He swallows. Like, if Moon gave us intel. Why put it on that? Why not our implants? Yknow? Another swallow. His head twisting. Like. aint it a little suspicious? Yeah. I mutter. Pushing past, in a whisk of tail. It is. "Guess so, mate.... But. Like. Don''t you think The Hand is..... Like, way too close? Like Moon planned this....?" "Yeah." I mutter as we chase to the door. The tiny dataStick hot in my hand. You''re both right, but were stuck in a corner here. Our [Sniper] grumbles as we rejoin her in the hall. Her slick new pistols trained on both ends. Her voice too low to register, except on comms. If we pool our SMG ammo, weve got enough for two out of three guns. Her head shakes. For one trip. Four, if you count Badger. I prompt. She stops. Spook. When have you ever given Badger ammo? Once. I cringe-shudder. Never again. "Mate. Shit. Movement." Zip hisses, and we hurry for the lifts. Either way. Kami adds on, as we slide back into their relative safety. We get, maybe, one trip with the gear we got. She drops her guns, as the doors clicks shut. Volume rising. So whatever it is, we have GOT to make it count. If we dont. She lets out a shaky breath. .were done here. I get it mate. Zip nods, as we start our coded tapping. But, like, I aint talking about sneaking in ourselves. I aint that dumb. We got other weapons. Right? Like, other ways of shifting tons of junk to the towers? If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. Kami hisses. You cant possibly be thinking of offloading The Night Tyrant in public! I seize up. The Precious! Mate! Hey! Cmon! I mean my drones! Oh thank bloody goodness. I wheeze, slithering down the metal wall. Stealth tek like that? In the main towers? Id get an unbeatable one-time offer the second I landed. Oh yep. Kami mimes shooting me. With artillery. Nah, mate. Nah. He flickers a hand. If we arm up all the drones I got, like, we can trade junk for materials. Then maybe pull some item bounties, or whatever. Right? Easy. Don''t even gotta go out. Sounds good. Can ya pull a drop tonight? I ask, but he hesitates. Uh. kinda.... no. Maybe in like, a week? Two weeks? He rubs his neck - embarrassed. What? Two!? Two weeks!? Kami shakes her head. Well. Carriers a bit, uh. in bits, mate. A lotta bits. Yknow? Im sorta putting it together, but- I groan. "We''re actually worse off than I thought." Wait. No drones?" Kamis metal-studded eyebrows rise. "So how are you assembling it? Uh. Slowly? Zip tries as that cringe threatens to implode him. I mean, well, the Carrier drones are sorta ''slaved'' to it. But, like, I got a few toys on the side. Couple of jets. Not much, but, like..... I fend him off. Too slow, Zip. Pressures on. Cookers off. Har har, mate. He rubs his neck again. We do this. I state. We got power. We got a shot at The Dead Mall, downstairs." I swallow. "Its deep in, but theres an entire 3D Printer Supplies shop. If it''s still there.... if we can get to it.... Suicide, mate. Zip cringes. Like, we dont got a lot of cameras. but. But, like, the ones we do. Memory prickles my mind with huge, terrifyingly indistinct, shapes. Fallen hallways. Things seen only through ink and living grime. It aint good in there. Yknow? Or the rec deck above. Not. I grin. With The Left Hand. We could break through the ceiling, even. Spook. Like.... A sharp breath. No." I shake him off. "Polybius thinks Wayman have a soddin B-Team. And a C-Team. And, right now, they''ve gotta be tuning up to rip us apart." I pick at my tail, tip. Clutching it. Like every GMO''s first blankie.... "Two weeks. Even if Wayman can''t track us, I bet The School set off a lot more bounties than that. And agents of their own." My claws click, and twitch. Every GMO''s first weapons. "We need an edge. We need Power. Power so vicious and vast, no monster of maniac will mess. Ever again.. Because if they do. All we''ve gotta do is.... I point a finger at the door. Boom. I pause for a long instant. That wouldve been a great time for that to open. Kami snorts. About twenty, full, seconds before it actually does - and we peer out through that crack once more. Hunting shadows in the shadows. In the darkness. In the cracked mirror, and the empty doorways. In that quiet, velvet-red nothing, drifting with dust. And then we slip out. Padding toward that door, as my heart begins to panic. Clawing at my ribs. Desperate to get out. Get out. Get out. What if shes there again? Waiting? Wafting.... Waiting for me. For us..... A scuttle of soft things on velvet. My jagged ears snapping from point to point. Twisting this way and that. The torment of expectation building as we turn the corner. Seeing the endzone. Which is when the whisperers start. I blink, and Zipper is facing the other way. Just like that. Fast as can be, A shock of wind on my face as his gun jumps at invisible targets. Seeking out lives to end. He doesnt even stop. Heels sliding, backward, across carpet as we close distance on our target. Our goal. Our safety. If it''s even that. But something is coming. Ssshshshshssssss.. A hand slips to my belt. A flasher grenade snapping to my palm. Bulbs charging. Step. And step. And step. And- A meaty, hairy, arm slides from the dark hole of a doorway. Thick with muscle. Stretching too far. It grips the edge of the door. And another follows it. Another. Another. A crawling flood of fingers, of all different kinds. Mens arms. Women. Human, and GMO. Swaying and twisting. Bending, like rubber. Like fronds underwater. Like things from a very bad dream. Child Eater. I whisper, as it flows up the wall like some boneless and demented spider. Seemingly mouthless, yet eerily hungry. Vents in Zippers gun explode with flame as he fires. Loosing a roar of blazing streaks that pummel the thing back. I roll to the side, and unleash a quad-shot. Snapping flesh. Aiming for the thick web of heart-muscle driving its core. Kami above me unleashing a storm of 10mm slugs at full-auto speeds. Lower arms blurring to reload as the upper arms fire. Our wall of bullets tearing chunks from the monster. Ripping off hands. Mutilated arms lash like tentacles. Thin as they stretch. Fat as they compact. Bending and flailing in impossible ways as they clench their ruptured ends to cut off the flow of blood. The thing screaming, without mouths. Wailing, without lips. More limbs rising. Limbs with sucking holes and sniffing noses. I slap the flasher to my belt to get it out of the way. Then I slap Kamis arm. And shove my SMG at Zipper. He grabs it, duel-wielding as I crick my neck. Claws splaying. "Mayhem time." And then, as the nightmare rolls toward us, on arms that compact and stretch. Hurling itself- I erupt from the floor in a blur of speed. Hit the wall. Hit the other wall. And then I slam down upon it with both feet. Claws pointed. Grabbing. Ripping. Slashing. Tearing. Gore splattering my visor. darkening my vision. But I trained for this. For not being able to see. I navigate on sound. Smell. And touch. Plunging my claws down, deep, into the mass. Hand and foot. Puncturing the flexible sack of pumping muscle at its heart. The thing''s hiss rising to a scream as I tear off arms and hurl them at the walls. Punching my claws into the mass. Finding the tiny cluster of almost-brains, and squeezing. The creature jerks. I scream. And then I plunge in my other arm, to join my legs, and rip the damn thing in half. Shoving with all four limbs at once. Dropping to the floor. Die. I whisper. And it obeys. Slowly, I flick out my hands. Reaching up to wipe something long and jointed from my helmet. The stink of rocket-smoke billowing through the air. Third one.... " An arm flops, and slithers, twisting itself into knotted stillness. The gore and goo the thing soaked into my skin. And there''s a part of me that enjoyed murdering it. Especially after Moon, and its vilenes. To just cut free. To destroy something evil, and tangible, and killable.... for the sheer joy of it. To bring harsh light into bad places, and make the things in the dark afraid. That''s what I want to be. We race back for the door. Heartrate never dipping for a second as we tap at the intercom. Bundling inside, all at once, and snapping the door behind. "Mate. Dang, like that was badass." He coughs. "Also, you kinda stink." I really. I say, very slowly, as the scanner does its thing. Really, really, miss my sodding PAW. Not as half much as you miss with the PAW. Kamis lip quirks, right by my eye. Shurrup. I grumble, tiredly. You only hit stuff cause your bullets are bigger than they are. Still. She shivers, as we bundle out. My whole body lost to shaking as I try not to lean on the wall. Or to touch things, generally. I think that proves it.... Yeah. I know. I look up at her. We cant wait. Even if nobody come for us. Even if Wayman, The School, an everyone else forgets we exist.. I shake my head. Well run out of ammo in a week or two, just living here. And claws can''t kill everythin''..... But our flat is a dim light huddled at its evil heart. A glimmer of warm hope, and joy, and sometimes even peaceful sleep. And my mini cheer squad. YAY!!! SPOOKS BACK! SPOOKS BACK!! Badger cheers, waggling furiously and jumping about. I KNEW YOU COULD DO IT!! Kami bomps him on the head. And what are we? Monster guts? Badger sniffs. Then gags. EWWW! YES!!! Not as stinky as YOU! She scoffs. Even so, Im hitting the shower. I snort. With my armour on. SsssPOOKIES!!! Gremlin cheers - letting go of Tuftys ear, with her teeth. SPOOKIES SMELL TASTYssss! Seriously Kami grumbles. Im not even good enough to get mauled first? Hey, like, yget used to it. Zip smirks. Spook used to be- He hesitates. -like, babysit em. And stuff. All the time. Kami frowns at him. Really? Oh, yeah, like - Grem used to be, like, super tiny. So Spook used to wear her like a hat. Right? It was hilarious. He grins, sheepishly. And Spook was like the world champ of dragging the rest of us about. Specially Badger. Tufty. And Zip. Demon. The others.. A little party of chaos..... Her eyes flip from me to him. Huh. Feels like you''re missing a bit out. Zip fumbles both guns. "Hah, probably mate." "Yeah. Life story and all that. Catch up later. Or whatever. I guess. I mumble off backing into the bathroom, a little too quick. Leaving Kami to frown at the door. A second later, her personal Mute Zone flickers up over the living room, and I plunge into the shower. Water roaring at me from every direction, as I turn it up full blast. Really hope he doesn''t tell her.. .he better not. .he cant.. > > >< < < >> Toys in the Attic >> Toys In The Attic The shower''s heat buffets me in a scalding roar, but I feel barely any of it within my armour. Cocooned as I am. But I wash off my hands, my feet. Scrubbing the crannies and dings to get rid of the blood. Midway, I hop from the desecrated shower and pat down my armour with a mostly-clean towel. Leaves of metal and plastic unfolding from my body as I hit the release. Gold circuits glimmer, like oil, on my slick underlay as I step out of the legs. Grenades and tool-packs arranging themselves around the edges as they fold down into a tight block. I step back inside, and yelp. The fiery water burning though my skull. My face. Sheering from the rubbery shell of my skintight suit as I scrub it down with soap. Thankful the ancient filters and pumping machines still labour deep beneath The City, maintained by things humanity has long forgot. I dry off again, and collect my suit. My guns. And.... ....with some hesitation.... ....the dataStick. Light shimmers in its inky surface. The etched-in eyes of Moon filled with a perverse and mocking flicker. As if theyre alive. As if the monster sees through them. My lips tighten, and I grip it hard enough to hurt. Staring at the monster graven into its surface. There will come a day. And an hour. And a moment. I exit the bathroom. Dumping my stuff by the couch, and ducking a giggly red monster. Spoookiess!!! Messs bordsss! Needsss play-playssss!!! Not now squirt! I yelp, dodging the rebound. Butsss me play-playsssss!! She trills again - a happy lil lump of mischief, sailing right over my head. "Me''sss wanna-wanna goesss outss bitingsss!!!" "Bitings??" I wince. "Y''mean like.... random people?" Tiny, adorable, little nods. "Uh, yeah, lemmie think about that!" I yelp, darting up the iron-railed staircase on all fours. Wet fingers and feet slipping and sticking on old wrappers as I punt stuff off the side to distract our tiny terror. Up here, the carnage is less severe - thanks to gravity. But that dont mean its tidy. Old pop cans litter everything - especially the fine wooden table, overlooking the devastation below. Cushions and chairs tossed this way and that. Pillows and duvets scattered, wildly, and in various states of destruction. I hop round it all to confront the two little ovoid bedrooms cupping Zippers gaming den. A hallowed hall he calls The Nest, and we call The Beanbag Horder Zone. The nearest bedroom is Badgers, and the less said about mad cackling the better. I wont be going in there without a full Hazmat team, a bomb squad, and an exorcist. The row of fire extinguishers beside it are not a decoration. But, if anything, the furthest bedroom is even more disturbing. And strange. I slip open the door, and step into an empty void of immaculate carpet and perfectly clean walls. Not just wiped clean, but clinically sterilised. As if every germ and speck of dirt was personally, and individually, eliminated with the precision of an assassin. There is no junk at all. Nothing. No garbage. No chaos. No objects, even. Just a pale stretch of blank carpet, and a bed. Its sheets crisp, and perfect, and utterly flat. The single, pale, occupant laid out like a vampires corpse. Almost totally obscured by the storm of vScreens shimmering around his head in a whirl of glitching madness. A storm archaic film reels, hacked emails, and broken websites dredged from ancient and forgotten servers - down, down, deep in the ruins. All of it blurred together into a singular insanity of distortion and chaos. No. Not a chaos. Theres an order to it. A precision. In it, I see flickers of words. Of old headlines, and hints, and whispers of long-ago panic. Hints of "Quarantine" and "Police" and "Shutdown". Of people saying "it''s nothing" or "It''ll be contained". All sewn together by a dark thread of mind-mangling narrative that urges you, hungrily, to unpick it. To pull the truth of what happened free from the morass of chaos and guesswork and panic and fiction. Welding a twisted thread of reality from the scraps and noise. And the more you look at it, the more you want to- Polybius. Whispers a boyish voice loaded with alien, almost academic, sophistication. Timeline four, at position 78. Do insert the following items- Hey.? -then timeline two, at position- I give the nearest leg a sturdy claw-poke, but he never yelps. Do you mind? Not at all! I grin. Electing a tired little sigh of resignation as the screens compact to a small square of virtual light, and vanish. Revealing a boy too beautiful to be real. Like a thing from a dream. A movie. A painting. But, above all.... ...like a thing. A not-human thing. With the large, copper-gold, eyes of a boy of eleven. Or maybe twelve. With skin of cream, and silk, so flawlessly perfect it''s outright ethereal. Otherworldly. Dusted, only, by artful brown freckles and precisely placed dimples. Then tousled all about by the ruffled, russet, strands of a highly elegant ponytail - tied up in an actual ribbon. Its shimmering threads splayed out on the sheets, as if this boy-doll was carefully posed there. Which it no-doubt was. Because some people look like they were ordered from a catalogue.... but he actually was. The bio-engineered thing in the bed stares up at me with shyly blinking eyes. Shifting his legs, to sit on the edge. As if he were caught being bad. And, slowly, like a knife through paper.... I begin to see the shy, shrinking, person behind the eerily airbrushed image. Ah. Apologies. I was conducting a little research. He says in that same, strangely cultured, tone that doesn''t fit his face. The kind children only get if they''ve been trained and moulded to speak that way. ''Or'', a little voice whispers, ''if they had the "Your Perfect Son (Type 6)" personality uploaded into their perfect, synthetic-organic, brain....'' Right. Sure. No worries. That''s cool, I guess...." I stutter out, to cover. "Hey, y''seen that old laptop? I peer under the bed, and almost recoil at the horrifying sight. "Damn. No wrappers.... No cans..... No mouldy anythin''...! No dust even! Its bloody unnatural, in here! I hesitate, then raise my head. You need tmess this place up a bit. Y''know? Chuck some knickers about. I see. He says, after a moment. ''Messy Kid'' being an unpopular personality module. A noise behind me. Hey? Laptop? Whatcha want with that? Kami says from the door, eyes quivering with restless energy. I roll out from under the bed. I gotta jam my thing in it. I declare, waving the dataStick at her. Your thing, huh? She smirks. Whats wrong with your implant? I blink, sitting up. Sharply. What. I look at the stick. Then at her. Its from Moon. No reaction. Its Moons dataStick. You literally just.. She laughs a bit, weirdly cheery. Well, for Kami at least. I guess that makes sense! Okaaay. I glance back at the synthetic organism on the bed, who frowns. Perfectly. As if observing a world that only happens to other people. Well..... Look, dya know where it is or what? Cause it aint in here.... And neither is anythin else. Ive been using it as a coaster. She smirks, as if it were obvious. Its not good for much else. I jump myself up, and waggle a hand at her. Alright then! Gimme! I need a secure way to contain this- She snags the drive, with an actual giggle. Nah, Ill do it! Youll only muck it up! I snatch it back, and scoff. Laptop. Kamis teeth glitter. Whatever you say, boss!" Her eyes shift, and she laughs uproariously. "Try not to share it with any creepy pretend-people! Specially not the lazy ones who wont even train with us! I dont even glance at the bed. .deal? She tilts her eyes, sticks out her tongue, and rudely gestures her way out. Leaving confusion and surprise in her wake. As well as a nice, wide, inviting door. Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Which is obligingly filled by a small round brown face covered in cupcake sprinkles, glitter, and probably semtex. Which no doubt came from him mixing said sprinkles, glitter, and semtex into some kind of exploding- SPOOK! Um, hey, uhhh. Hahaha! Could I- In a minute, Badge! I grumble, lumping back towards Theo. "And I better not find you''ve bloody boobytrapped the food!" "YEEEP!" He jumps, darting back out the door. I sigh. Turning to sit, awkwardly, on the corner of his bed. Look.... I ain''t great with this stuff. And I know its rough here with- I jerk my head back at the door. -but, look, things ain''t ever gonna go well with the team if ya hide up in here...." Undoubtedly. The boy says, sliding his thin legs away. However; my research is important..... and.... He droops, generally. "...I feel that they see me as a...." "Guy who hides in a box cause he''s up to somethin''?" I say, very quickly. The breath drains out of him in a voiceless sigh, and his eyes turn away. "Look.... It ain''t-" But he raises a refined hand. "Please.... don''t. I''m well aware that Zipper and Demon believe I am ''The Traitor''." "Total bleedin'' nonsense." I retort. "They only said that to stop Kami murdering Tufty." "I find....." He trembles, quietly. "...that quite revealing." "Yeah...." I look away. "I guess." "Do you recall his words to you?" The thing''s voice shifts to mimic Zipper, perfectly. "Aristo kids, mate. They''ll, like, sell you up the street for a lollypop. Right?" "Fu- You- You sounded-" I lean back. "Quite so." He whispers, in his own true voice. "You know what I am, after all." Words like ''doll'' slither their treacherous way through my mind. "One of us." I state, cold and calm. "I will betray you." He says, softly. Regarding me with those same shy, yet placid, eyes. "I am a liability, by design." "You-" "Please, don''t fall into that folly." He whispers, raising those boy-pianist fingers once more. The words at odds with his childish-sweet tone. His doe-eyed face. "My kind were sculpted to be perfect, living, playthings." No ire. No anger. Nothing. "And, we all know, The ''Perfect Child'' is quite agreeable to adults. To parents, especially." I swallow. "Theo." "We do what we are told." His face turns to mine, and all the emotions are wrong. As if he were telling me about his day at school, or a movie, or his favourite thing. "Whatever the parent.... or master.... desires, that is what I am." He never chokes, nor sobs. But there''s something- "Ageless. Undying. Alive, and yet not. Eternal child. Puppet. Pet. And a good deal more." His fingers bite knees, as the warm fa?ade cracks. "For as long.... as I am required." "But-" My voice stumbles. "I cannot help it. I cannot turn it off. And.... you cannot...." He smiles, sweetly. "I informed you.... I told you, right from the beginning that you cannot ever begin to trust me. Nor I, myself." He allows himself to fall back, onto the bed. "My fondest, deepest, desire.... is to please the owner I no longer have. Which makes me little more than a lost toy. One that anyone may steal and imprint." "Own yourself!" I snap. His head turns. "How may I do that?" He can''t even beg. "How may I overcome that which I was made to be?" "I....." His head shakes. "I will follow you as far as I can. But you must know....." The boy-thing smiles, gently, peeping at me over the bed. "Adults outrank teenagers.... and I will want to do as they say. Exactly as they say. I can no more disobey them than I can chop off my hands." His eyes remain bright and clear he stares at me. "So I will betray you, one of these days, my friend. Without even a thought. And it will not be my choice, nor yours." Perfect fingers touch his perfect face. "They may order me to forget, until the moment I must shoot you in the back. And how would you, or I, even know?" "Jesus." I breathe. And I thought I was dysfunctional.... "So.... now you see why I must isolate myself?" He whispers. "Why I can do more good, in here, when I do not know what you are doing? Where I cannot be ordered to act against this group?" His head shakes. "I am sorry. I tried to warn you.... before the escape..... but...." An almost imperceptible shiver. "I will be your undoing." My ears snap flat, and I snarl. Fighting the urge to grip him, and to not. "I don''t bloody accept that!" I snap. "I can''t." The perfect smile dims. "Reality is what reality is. No matter the dreams of fools." My hand snaps to grab his chin, but my other grips it. "No." I shake my head. "The School said we were theirs as well." I stab a claw at his nose, and he barely shies back. "But I''ll be DAMNED if I''m owned! If I''m bought and sold! Or if you are!" I shake the claw. "So deal with it! You''re more than some bio-sculpted.... thing! Own yourself!" "If you say...." He shrivels in on himself, and hugs his hand to his chest. "I... I don''t know....." He starts to shake. True tears failing to so much as threaten the edges of his placid, cheerful, eyes. "I.... I am told to be Real. And I would so very like to be..... But, even now, I cannot tell if that is merely because I have been told to be." His whole body stiffens, then relaxes. "And. Even were you a parent, or a master, I do not know if I could obey....." Zooming outta nowhere - like a tiny, mucky, angel, streaming snot and tears and all sorts - Badger throws himself toward the germaphobe. "Spook can''t hug you, but I can!" He cheers, happily. "And you''re TOTALLY real!" "Not helping, squirt." I block his sudden charge with a foot. "Real." Theo shudders again. Eyes closed. His expression never once crossing a line that might be inconvenient to adults in public. That might embarrass them. Might force them to console, or nurture, a product built purely for show. "I wish to be Real. A real boy. Yet I am so afraid I am not.... and the terror burns inside me. It hurts." "Cause you''re real." I tell him, with a smirk. Foot still planted on Badger. "Look...." A swallow. "I ain''t exactly.... not a paranoid bastard." I wince, then snort. "Because ya gotta be, right? To survive at Tanky School? But. I draw a long breath. "You were bleedin'' there with us. Through it. And you made that goddamned escape happen, no matter what anyone bloody thinks." I turn to him, and almost rap him on the chest. "You are not a goddamned toy. Or a puppet. Or a bloody pet. You''re a... a you. Understood?" "Perhaps." His eyes bore, politely, into mine. Like The Citys mildest power-drill. "It would mean so much to me, if.... if I could be.... a person." "You are!" Badger insists again, hopping about and trying to dodge me. Pure of spirit, if literally nothing else. "Yep." I grin. "Which means you''re outvoted." "I suppose." A small, wan, smile. Inoffensive, like him. "But." I add. "Bein'' one of us means bein'' one of us. So. Let''s talk about how we''re gonna get your jammy ass downstairs." I raise a hand to cut him off, though he says nothing at all. "We even got food now, and it''s perfectly sterile. So lets go stuff a few sweets in ya gob! Alright?" My hand twitches, as if itching to slap his back in a reassuring way. "C''mon! They''ll put a bit of. chest. on your chest?" His lip quirks. "I will.... pass. Thank you. This.... this is already too much interaction. And I will need to decontaminate myself. And the room." That shudder, again. "Polybius tells me.... my phobia is an attempt to manufacture a world I can control. Because I know.... that I can control nothing else." He gestures to the cold, empty, walls. "But for this false and barren womb." Yeah. Well. I dunno about that..... I scritch my ear, fretfully. "Lot of Aristos are.... obsessed." "I am no Aristo." He states, in that same quiet tone. "No." I grin. "You ain''t nothing. Nothing at all. A blank slate" I jab that claw at his nose again. "Which means... you could become anythin''. Anything at all. Without limit." His eyes barely widen. As if even that is too much. "I see." "We save up a little, and there''s ways to fix you. Gene therapy. Cybernetics." I breathe. "So start dreaming. Start planning. Cause one day I''m gonna sit you down in front of a damned catalogue, and it''ll be your turn to order whatever you goddamned please." He stares at his hands. "Sometimes." He almost murmurs. "I have dreams.... of wings.... of soaring...." "Well.... It''s on the cards. You want wings. Tail." I flick mine. "Bark for skin. Or just plain human.... It''s up to you. Ain''t like body parts are hard to remove, if ya get bored of em. Or put back." I wince. "Well. Long as we got the cash." I stare off at the door. So much we need. So little money. Badger''s hand. Theo''s brain. All of our implants... His hands close. "I.... I will think about it.... Though I doubt I rate high on our priorities." His living doll-eyes turn to me. "It''s strange, though. When I dream of that.... it always ends with you..... tearing off my wings." "That...." I stumble. "....is kinda wild." A tilt of a smile. "Perhaps my mind searching for an owner. It''s hard to say." I look away, to hide the wince. "Talk to Polybius. It does good with dreams...." My head snaps back, a fangy grin forming. "But. In the mean time. That reminds me.... My claw jabs out. I want ya to train with me. Privately. His eyes flicker. Pri- Oooh, wait Spook! I just remembered what I wanted!!! Badge suddenly yelps, on the end of my foot, hopping about like he needs the loo. Right up until somebody decks him with Theos pillow, and chases him out the door. "As I was saying." I grin, kicking it shut. Are we sure. training something like me is a good idea? The synthetic boy says. Yeah. I do. I growl. Strong is good. Weak is bad. Weak is a liability. And, right now, youre made of cotton-candy and fairy wishes." I turn on him. "Weakness is your whole problem. .but well get you there. Or thereabouts. Or close enough. If. You say so. I do. I nod. Its good for you. Good for the team. Give you a will of your own. So. I hesitate. Tell ya what - Ill shoot you a copy of our Training Program. We can hotwire it right into your fancy Aristo implants, so you know how to fight. My eyes flicker across his thin, decorative, limbs. Or, at least, start to. I dont th. Thank you, but. He seems touched, but sceptical. Fidgeting with his long, thin, fingers. ....the last. the last time I tried. I blow a breath out. Yeah. Look, I know you kinda got demolished. I cough. .by Badger. WOO!!! YEAH! AND IT WAS ULTRA BRUTAL!! The dork cheers, leaping back through the door to execute a tiny-but-solid elbow-drop on the pillow. I never beat-up no one big before! I snort. "He ain''t that big." "Whahh!? But he''s huge!" The squirt yells, bouncing about like a tiny bomb. "And you''re even more huge! Miles and miles huge!" Yeahhhh. Anyways. Ydid pretty well." I say to Theo. "Considering hes nine. I cough again. And crippled. Theos eyes never narrow, but they gain a spark of almost-flame. And I suppose youll be pitting me against a toddler to practice? I do hear they''re vicious, but lets not get ahead of ourselves, eh? I grin. Winningly. Lets just get ya outta here, and get ya some of that exercise stuff everybody''s talkin'' about. Alright? Build some. some. I shoot a sceptical squint at his slender arms .muscles? If you say so. The boy-shaped thing says, very calmly. Cant say Im looking forward to it. Yeah. Guess gettin pinned by a one-armed squirt aint on anyones bucket list. I try not to snort. But, still. Train a little. Grow a little. And, one day, if you do it right. you can fight im again. And- WOOOOO!!!! DEATHMATCH REMATCH!! BRUTAL!!!! Badger explodes behind me, punching the air. Hey! One thing at a time! I yelp, but hes raring off to tell every bugger wholl listen (plus every bugger who wont). And probably saying its right now, too. Well, that went great. I suppose I could. try.? Theo hedges, in a bashful tone. One loaded with undercurrents of I hope I drop dead. Hey, cmon! It wont be that bad! Provided I tell the disabled tween to go easy on him. Mental cough. I mean, you wont actually die. Probably. Fingers, toes, and freaking tails crossed. And- I suppose well have to see. The boy thing murmurs, with a final shy smile. I open my mouth. Shut it. Then shake my head. Guess well find out.. But right now? I toss the dataStick in the air, and catch it. We got a little gift from Moon to unpack, so lets get ya tail down to The Command Centre. He hesitates. Torn between his need to please, and the torment of phobia. I''m sorry. As.... as much as I enjoy this conversation." He whispers. "My research is somewhat vital. And...." And other excuses. "And, I''m sorry, but you..... He gives a small sniff. You smell strange. Wrong. Almost..... contaminated. Probably the viscera. I say, knowledgeably. Ah. His eyes gravitate to the micron of fabric Im occupying. Superb. I jolt upright, and away. Guilt streaming through me. "Uh. Yeah. Catch ya later, then, I guess...." He nods quietly, as I step away. One hand burning with an umbra of dangerous purple as it passes, slowly, over the sheets. Leaving them unstained, and perfect. For a moment I pause, right at the door. Swallowing quietly. As if there was something I could say. Something that would bring this boy-like thing out of its strange, sterile, shell. Bring it down into the warmth, the light. And the shadow. To people who view him as something unsettling. A nearly-person. Not one thing, or the other. But a thing, none the less. A thing with ideas. A thing with secrets.... > > >< < < >> The Box That Should Have Been Empty >> The Box That Should Have Been Empty
## Polybius neuroNode [44-B] set to mode :: [Dream Observer]
A vast bell tones against halls of stone, as I chase through torrents of falling light. Colours and windows blurring on past. Pillars of polished rock, and floors of gleaming stone. Warm, and brown, and hunted by children. For a while, I''m a baby. A little kid, once more. Pattering. Pittering. Laughing at our games. And so many there are, all blurred into one! A sea of tails, and funny little ears.... "You gotta come! You gotta come!" I yell as I tug on a much bigger hand. A big, big, girl - her face lost to time. Empty of detail. Empty of memory. A ghost, in all but name.
## WARNING :: [Unknown Memory] ## Event Rating :: [Positive], [New] ## Natural Memory Transition :: [Accepted] ## Memory Capture Systems :: [Activated] ## Capturing :: [New Memory 0001]
"Nyaa! Slow down! Slow down!" The rabbit girl yells. Or maybe not. Maybe that''s me, and I''m being dragged? It''s hard to remember! The world is a blur! A chaos! A whirl of faceless faces, and fuzzy little heads! A hundred GMO children of every strange kind! Chasing us! Chasing us! As we run, run, run! Bounding like wind, as we leap on all fours!
## Detecting :: [Subconscious Event Linkage] ## Natural Memory Transition :: [Denied]
"There! There! There it is!" I yell and hop and dance. "I found im! I found im!" And the world snaps into focus. Sharp as a blade. Right as rabbit-girl drops my tiny hand. Because it''s the day I found..... Oh my GOD! Look at his little kitty ears! Theyre so CUTE!! The older girl gasps, wiggling her nosie and tugging her own! Her lugs so big, they should tickle her knees! "Heeey! I can''t seee! I can''t seee!!" I yell, and flail, and the crowd swarms in! Battering me with wings! Sweeping me with tails! Knocking me flat, and bowling me around! "Not fair! Not fair! I found im!!!" But then I''m dragged up! I''m put right in the middle! A circle of stone, beneath a ceiling of faces.... with no faces at all. Every one of the huge! All the big kids! All crowding and talking round that ratty old box! "Woo! Smells like it got used as a toilet!" Someone gags. "Yuck! And dat widdle kitty even worse!" Another wails. "Stinky, mucky, AND ewwie!!" "AND gross!" "I bet he DID have a widdle!" Says one of the others, knowledgably. "I bet eee had a HUGE widdle!" "EEEWWW! NOO! Dun say that!" Says big rabbity girl, tugging down on her ears! "You gonna make em longer, doin'' that!!!" Giggles another. A little bat boy. "Den they''ll be so long dey-" "Shhh!" She hushes, as the little box stirs! "Shhh! Shhh! Shhhh!" And I remember that pillar. That pillar behind it. I know this place. It''s the hallway right by my childhood room. The Lost And Found Box nobody could ever find. A box full of string, and bits of old tat. Full of chewed on balls, and broken dolls. All muss, and dust, and things from long ago. Plastic bricks, all on their own. And foam orange darts without any gun. Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator. Except, not today. Today is different. And I never even thought. I never even wondered..... Who did this? Who left him there? Right there? Right in the middle of the hall? Without even one of us seeing? And.... I....
## Detecting :: [Subconscious Destabilisation] ## Detecting :: [Host Interference] ## Stimulating Hormone Mix :: [Nostalgia], [Warm Fuzzes]
But..... But then I see him! I see him, again, for the very first time! And he blinks up at us all with the most amazing green eyes! Little emerald slits, like a cat from a picture book! With a little green tail, frisking all about, as he opens his tiny mouth wide! Revealing just one little fang! MIIIIIII!!!!! The girls all gasp. Ohh! Thats so cute! Hes calling for his mommy cat and dada cat! The biggest gushes, pattering her bare feet on the bare brown stones! Hopping and bounding in bunny-girl glee! Dada Joans gonna be so thrilled we found him!! WE!? I huff very loudly, fighting my way between all the legs and tails of MUCH bigger kids. I FOUND HIM! And Im gonna name him too!!! SO THERE!!!! Oh, shhh shhh Spookiekins! Youll just name him something stupid again! Scolds that bunny-eared girl. See! Im going to give him a proper name! Hes a kitty, so Im gonna name him Catspian! Get it? Caspian the cat! Cat-spian! NOO!!! I yell, stamping toes and claws on the big big stones! All huffing and snorting and humming about! I found im! I found him!!! So I gotta name im!!! Oi. Shut up, Stoopy Spooky! One of the boys scoffs, poking me hard with a sharp doggy claw. Yeah! The big rabbity girl smirks, with her big stoopie face and buttony nose! Looming down at me, like she owns the whole dang hallway! And what did you name the last one, huh? Go on? Mm-ffffff!!! I stutter, hid behind clawed lil hands. What was that? The boy scorns, joining in. Wagging his wolfish tail. I named him Poopie!" I shout. "Cos his tail was brown like a big ole p-!!! EWWWW!!! The girl sticks her tongue out, and I feel ashamed. Shes just gone nine - and thats very grown up! Way more than me! So I sniffle a bit, staring down at my toesies. And she softens. Alright. Alright. You get ONE try! But it better be a good one - or well NEVER let you name nothin again! Not for nine million-zillion years!! Eeee! But r-really? I beam through all the snot and the tears. Really really? I can name im!? Mmm hmm! You can TRY!!! She nods, very importantly - huge bunny ears all flopping about. But it better be a good un!! OR ELSE!!! A little space clears, and I scurry into it. Nervous as heck, with all these big kids! But the tiny lil kitty-boy in the box is even scared-er! He lowers his little head, and mews so tiny! All hunkered, and peeping! Little ears dropped, in his mixed-up strands of darker and lighter green. Miiiii? I get down close, holding my nosie! And I gotta think real hard! Gosh, but he stinks tho! I dun even want to waggle my tail for him to batt at! He smells so bad! But I gotta think quick! Gotta channel all the power of cartoons and books and everything!! Oooooh! Ooooh! What do I call you.? I dont dare say my ideas! Not with them all stood about! But what? Greenie? After his hair? OOOH!!! Nooo! I went on colours last time, and look what happened! Nope nope nope! Better huuuury uuuuup!!! Some stoopid says, nudging my back with a rough-padded foot or a scratchy-pawed hand. Tick tock! Tick tock!! Tufty!!! I shout, making lil kitten duck in all kinds of fright! Im gonna call im Tufty! Coz is ears is all fuzzy n tufty! An theres a kitty on TV- Uh huh-? The scoff is so sly! An I dont care wot you all think!" I rage against em all! "Ill call im that even if yew dont! I yell, kicking the cobblestone wall with my pads. SO THERE!!!! MIIIII!!!! Baby Tufty cries, possibly in fright. Or agreement!! Oooh! I think he likes it!!!! Says a big scaly thing! With a million wings for arms! Nah. I think hes just hungry. Grrs a tiger-stripy boy with a tiger-stripy tail. Cmon! Lets get im outta that horrid ole box! We gotta show Joan!! So someone pulls off their shirt, and wraps up the little lump! "Wait wait wait! I gotta go!! I gotta hold him!" I yell in baby panic! And I get to hold on to one corner! Tiny kitty peeping at us, all shyly, through his muss as we carry him away through our big stone house! We soon find Joan all up in the library, teaching some tots to ABC! But never mind that, as we bustle all around! "Oh my, so that''s...." He murmurs as he takes off his glasses. Peering down at that ickle face peeking out! All big eyes, and scaredie! And a mucky little tail, flicking about! "Yeah! We found him!" "Nuuu! I did!" But it''s no good at all! And all too soon Spook found him becomes we found him! And I''m not happy at all! But Joan believes me! I know he does.... And I help the little kitty have a million million baths. But, you know. I never did tell anyone how Tufty turned up. I never said nothin. Cos, maybe I was afraid. An maybe I pretended-ed it. And I know it''s not meant to happen. And.
## WARNING :: [ANOMALY] ## WARNING :: [ANOMALY] ## WARNING :: [ANOMALY] ## WARNING :: [Dreamspace] undergoing [Total Structure Collapse] ## WARNING :: [Heartbeat Elevated] at [83.5bps] ## Synchronisation :: 5.2% ## Attempting :: [Full Override]
But Tufty stayed Tufty! AND Catspian too! Coz Joan can put two names down in the little old book! And I looked after him good. I cuddled him tight!
## Polybius neuroNode [44-B] :: has suffered [NODE FAILURE] at level [CATASTROPHIC]
Except. maybe I didnt. Maybe its all my fault. ....he betrayed us..... > > >< < < >> This Is A Dream. Except It Isn’t. >> This Is A Dream. Except It Isnt.
## Polybius neuroNode [44-B] :: [CORE PROCESS] was [TERMINATED] by [ERROR], [UNKNOWN], [ANOMALY] ## Polybius neuroNode [44-B] :: [EMERGENCY SHUTDOWN INITIATED]
The Falling Dream begins the same way, every time. First, there is darkness, thick as smoke. Whiling up from beneath me. As if my bed were on fire. As if I were on fire. As if I were burning. Burning in neon and scalding-hot pain. Pain so real it burns through the dark. Burns through me. Yet my mind is a haze, and I am drifting. Drifting. As if with some terrible weight. In cacophony, and mayhem, I spin in that ink. Torn by its terrible light. By unknowable words, and billions of voices. A swarm of noise and chaos and hammering metal, that spirals the universe around me. I struggle. I scream. And then.... the world, cracks. The world, sunders. And I fall toward a monster. The Monster. The greatest of monsters - in all of its spender, and glory. The City. A thing of terrible colour and shadow, build of endless dreams and nightmares. But glittering with promise. Gleaming with light, and hope. And blood. And fury. As neon carves it from the pure, and utter, dark of the Deeps in which it dwells. Giving shape to things of ink you could call people. Things that watch me, from their glowing yellow windows. In the dream, I have wings - and they burn as I try to fly. They sear me. They hurt. They tear from my body, and rend the shadows that hide me. Leaving me naked. Broken, already. And yet I fall. I fall. Back first. Shrinking into a ball, as the titanic pillars of our underground world go skinning past. Past things with hearts of metal, beating the raw power of fusion. They could be gods - the way they stand. They could be titans of old - waiting in the dark to crack the surface of the world above. To grow like vast and hideous trees. To retake the world from which they were cast. They reach for me, as I tumble - those monstrous gods. The clutch at me, and snarl. And I know that any one of them could take me. To eat me in but a single, tiny, bite. But I fall through their embrace. Their rusted hands. Blurring past infinite floors. Screaming. This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. Terrified. As they roar at me in the dark, with mouths full of fire and eyes. With teeth made of towers, and sins made of ink. And shadow things, with long stringy limbs, watching with hunger from great silent windows. Billions of them. Trillions. I hit the cloud-layer, and it blasts its raw and biting acid across my skin. A storm to scour away all tears, and dirt, and hope. Hollowing your soul. Burning its edges, like a flame. And washing scraps of ash from barren, broken, skin. And still I fall. And fall. And fall. Naked, and cold, and burning in the rain. I am unseen, and yet every eye fixates upon me. I am nobody. I am alone. Yet all the world will see me die. I am lost. I am afraid. Tumbling toward jagged rooftops, and gaunt walkways. Spinning as I fly between their daggers, and their strands. Toward caverns of jagged fire, and rot-soaked metal. Toward vast and monstrous things of rust and dirty glass. And I am a but child of bone and flesh to break upon them, nothing more. Lesser nightmares send their dark-thing hands of iron to grip at me. To cut. To cleave. And I am torn. I am broken anew. The pain is like nothing in a dream. The pain is sharp. Vile, and vital. Cold, and aware. Part of my very self is taken, and devoured. And then another. Another. Another.... Yet something falls through their grip. Something.... Me. I turn as I tumble. Still naked and torn. I drop my eyes from Heaven, and look upon Hell. And beneath me, is everything that Heaven is not. The footsteps of shining skyscrapers that touch no sky. That hold up the roof of a cavern, instead. No. Beneath that. Beneath. Beneath the sea of roiling smoke, rising from their feet. Beneath the storm. And metal. And dark. And violence. To a hungering void - built deep beneath the tread of mere mortal, metal, gods. And still. Still. Still, I fall. Past the twisted hulks of shanty tenements. All crooked angles and rusty metal. Past windows no human would make, twisted into scowls and snarls and sneers - directed at me. I see nothing inside them, yet they stare. Yet they howl. Yet they bite. Yet they reach to devour me, with hunger tenfold. The whole City does. Every bit of it. Every part, eager to devour me. With not a single ledge to grab, that will not bite my hand. But I never need to reach for them. For they grab my wrists ankles with things made of lampposts. My ankles with great iron bars. My neck with snaking rat-runs, that helter and skelter. Each of them gripping, and tearing. Needing me. Ripping me. Eating me away, with a thousand starved arms - desperate for flesh. With hands, and with fingers. With terrible eyes. Clawing through skin. Tangling me down. Dragging me. Plunging me. Carrying me away, into their vast and senseless maze. Choking my throat with treacherous ladders. Binding my heart, with great crushing roads. As roaring Hell-winds give demon voices to the limp-hanging cables Setting them to sing. To moan, and to rattle. To curse, and to chant. To spark, and to wither. As the water sips power from hacked-up junctions. Flickering the lights of The Above. And The City crows its vast and hateful joy. Sealing my exits, with fingers of rebar and lead. With cables and nightmares. With wires that wrap me. Dragging me down. Down. And Down. And Down. Forever, without end. Binding me up in those billions of threads. Twisting me up, into knots and convulsions. Sawing my flesh with razors strung on wires. As I fall. And fall. Crushing me tighter. Breaking my bones. Smashing my arms upon clifftops and gantries. Hammering my head upon rust and on spite. Binding me. Blinding me. Breaking me. Filling up my throat. Choking. Choking. Choking me, still. But in the deep. In the dark. In the utter, utter, void. The black beyond any black. Beyond any sense of light. I see..... I see.... I see..... a hand..... And I reach out. Fingers, slipping across fingers. Fingers tearing at fingers. Slick from the rain. Slick from the blood. The blood without end. And still I fall. But the hand is still there. The hand, and- Somehow. Somehow. It grips me. It slows me. Filling me with life. Burning through me. But then. Right at the very last second. Right when I think I''ve been saved. There''s no hand at all. No hand to save me. And I fall. I fall. Fall. Fa- .... > > >< < < >> The Four Gates >> The Four Gates
## News Scraper :: Returns [Connection Error] to [Polybius API] with Error Code [503 Service Unavailable]
My eyes flip open to an island of low, shadowy, light. A beacon in the dark, pooling from the laptop discarded in the centre of the coffee table. Bionic eyes fight to adjust to the dim holo-glow as mission-notes flicker across the many, many vScreens floating around me. Diagnostics drifting in one corner of my eyes, as the News Scraper searches for.... "Polybius?" My murmur stirs nothing. I shiver, quietly. Still caught within the dregs of dreams. With echoes of wire, and barbs, and snarling- I shunt them away, and squint. Clocking the sprawl of Demon, on the opposite sofa - flat on his back, with one leg drifted to the floor. Cushions arranged, quite carefully, so his tail falls into the gap. I shift, nervously. Rubbing an ear that got squashed in my midsleep struggles. Unsure of anything. Unknowing of anything. "Polybius?" I swallow. "Y''there? Hey?" Nothing. The News Scraper dies, having given the heck up, and I force myself to achieve some semblance of ''upright''. Focusing in on the single blue box situated exactly where Polybius was floating last night.
## Polybius Core :: [System Restart] was [TERMINATED] by [ERROR], [UNKNOWN], [ANOMALY] ## Polybius Core :: [System Failure] detected at level [CRITICAL]
That.... That is new. Polybius doesn''t have errors. Polybius doesn''t crash. Polybius is unstoppable. Except..... Suddenly, and without warning, that ain''t true anymore. What the Hell happened? "Polybius?" I hiss into the silence. "Shit....." No errors. No response. Nothing. It''s offline. I swallow, quietly. Polybius governs Security for the entire tower. If Pol is down, so is everything else - cameras, turrets, sensors. Literally everything - barring a couple of boobytraps we planted ourselves. We could be under attack, right now, and know nothing about it. In fact, knocking Polybius offline would be a terrific first move.... I grab a cushion, and hurl it at the opposite sofa. Demon''s eyes snapping wide as claws snake out to snatch it from the air. "Za''tat?" He whispers. "Yeah. Attack." I growl. "Or something. Pol is offline. No clue why." In a single, smooth, motion he spins upright. Flicking one arm over the edge of the sofa, and snapping out a single word. "Armour!" His battleTek suit leaps directly off the floor. Latching onto it. Disassembling, as he stands. Slamming it into his chest. The armour locks to brassy nodes on his underlay, and unfolds over his head. A roar of sparks busting from under it as he forces it into place. Jerking, angrily, as broken sections fight to compensate. A hard, violent, look stirs on his four-horned face. "Armour." I snap, as well, standing abruptly. "Come to me." Metal ticks and clicks as it leaps on my back, synching my implant as it begins to unfurl. Diagnostics roaring as I snatch up my SMG, and ram home a mag. Hurling a pistol at Demon, who spins to face the door as I leap to join him. Crouched, low, on either side of his ''bed''. Not your typical cover in a firefight, but lemmie tell you: nobody expects the bulletproof sofa. See, it turns out there''s a heck of lotta empty space inside these things. So we picked one, took it apart. Lined it with old steel plates, broken body-armour, strike plates, whatever we could find. Filled the backrest with Kevlar. Flooded the gaps with cans and cans of ballistic repair-foam. Turned the whole thing basically solid, then stapled all the fabric back on. Right after we stabbed ''point charges'' - aka mini claymores - into the base, of course. We only did one, and it''s a holdout of desperation - but it''s a bloody holdout. And we fully intend to use it, if we have to. "Mate! I''m online!" Zip yelps over comms, a second after my summon, as his SMG joining us from the balcony above. "Like, no drones but-" A door slams open, as our [Sniper] tumbles out of her ground-level bedroom. Groaning like the dead, and dragging her rifle. Cursing her way up the stairs, one by one, to slam it onto the rail. "Oh.... gods.... too bloody bright....." She blinks, hard, in the dim light. "Better.... bloody not be a bloody drill....." "It ain''t." I growl, at both statements. Vowing, for maybe the tenth time, to shuffle her into a top-floor room. If we survive. But as the seconds fill with nothingness, I feel the cold sweat of dread turn to calculation. A few seconds after that, I lower my gun. "In the words of the immortal bloody bard." I say, slowly. "Where''s the Kaboom?" Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon. Demon frowns at me. "Kah? What-?" A shake of his head. "Zey, we cannot be sure. Coming through walls?" "Walls. Ceiling. It''s what I''d do in an old flat...." I mutter, flicking my head to the upper floor. Badger is still asleep, judging by the lack of total chaos. One ear twists. Yep. Tufty is awake in his crate in the bathroom, and Theo.... is Theo. Which just leaves..... Something hot and scaly belly-flops onto the back of my head, slapping it forward. "Grem?" I yelp, as she bops at my face with rough lil paws. Giggling happily. "Spookie-ssss!" "Shit! Grem! No playtime! No! Go... go secure the vents!" I yell, gesturing furiously. "Nuuusss!! Spookiess!! Mess no wannasss!" She huffs up loudly, puffing her chest against my scalp, but hops off onto the lamp. Leaving me to martial the rest of our panic. "Shit. This is useless. We need eyes." I flick a claw at the others. "Keep the damn door covered. I''m gonna go see what the Hell happened to Pol." "Rrghh. Hurry up." Kami groans, sweat pouring down her face. With that, I spin on the spot - considering options. There ain''t many. The laptop crawls with fragments of data, websites, maps of The City. All of it coiling around a shimmering cluster of inverted towers - five claws, bound within an enigmatic web of neon. Centred around a mysterious, prismatic, gleam..... Intel from Moon''s dataStick. Useless - at least for now. I stare up at the silent turret. Its red light blinking, endlessly. "Hey! Pol!" Still nada. I glance up at the balcony for a second, scowl, bite my lip, and sigh. Turning to stalk my way into Kami''s room - past a wad of fabric, and a desk built of old ammo crates. Kicking open the cupboard to get at the security hub. Where I stop, and wince. Because.... well. Y''think punks are spiky? Ho boy. Try delving into their wardrobes. It''s like a pick n'' mix box of knives. Never the bloody less, I seal my helmet and wedge myself in - ignoring the various looted belts, jackets, and bits attempting to horribly puncture me. Therein I fumble a bit, flip a panel, hit the code on the box, and jack its cable into my skull. Stuffing my ass on the prickly back-shelf as Cyberspace engulfs me.
## Initiating :: [neuroJump]
I blur through rings of light, to slam face-first into a second - bigger, and somehow spikier - mass of things that also want to kill me. This time, a pack of virtual security bots - blocky pincers snapping at my face. "Oi! It''s me, you idiots!" I snarl. "Access code: Omega-four-four-four-four!"
## Accessing :: [Secure Home Hub v32.6644] ## Secure Hub :: Device [Spooks_Stupid_Implant_Thing] has been recognised ## Secure Hub :: [DNA] Confirmed ## Secure Hub :: [Voice Print] Confirmed ## Secure Hub :: [Secure Pin] Confirmed ## Secure Hub :: [Mental Imprint] Confirmed
The bots implode into a series of inert spheres as internal security shuts down. Dropping me into a twisted mesh of apartment hallways that pulse and shift like living things. Dark ruby carpets. Mirrors, streaming with data. The floor ahead consumed by threads of glassy black tar that shift with rainbow light..... I have dreams like this.... I hop onto the tar, and it buzzes with power beneath me. Flickers of information. Diagnostics. The oil ripples, as if it were alive. Shearing open the way ahead, like a dull knife through jelly. A portal. I hop through, and the world jumps. Landing me, on all fours, in a mirror of the hallway. Mirrors, lights, and everything. All of it carved from eerie red and black marble, cut through with threads of every radiant colour. Traces of delicate, intricate, clockwork ticking quietly in the cracks. Slow. Idle. As if winding down, or waiting to be called upon.... I touch one, gently, and it stops. Silencing an almost inaudible tick. The coloured light around me growing dimmer, by just a fraction. And, in my hackles, I feel it. I know it. This.... this place I''ve entered..... is not just some fancy interface. On some level, too deep to fathom, it is..... Real..... I shudder, and lash my tail. But what choice have I got? I slip forward, and onward, as reality bends around me. The mirrors lengthening into doors, and alcoves, and warrior statues of granite and iron. The ceiling rising. Arching. Bending upward, as the vast machine we call Polybius slowly subsumes and subverts our tower. Growing into it. Twisting its shape into something like its own. And, as I move deeper, the sensation of Realness grows. Building behind my eyes, like pressure. I step softly, and quietly, across tiles of cool and heavy stone. Each one precisely triangular, and so finely edged I can feel it. The gaps deepening, and filling with light, as the tunnel widens. Expanding in ways no physical structure would - or could - until it dwarfs even the ancient service-tunnels beneath our tower. Baroque autoGuns, carved from gold and marble, turning as I pass. Leading me deeper. I stop before a towering gate of bronze, cut with a single vast image. A tree woven from bright silver ribbons that shift like living things. They unfurl, and retract, into their trunk as the door splits. My toes clenching, slightly, as I force myself to proceed. Past golems tall as towers, finely carved from living rock and icy crystal. Past silvery guns with living eyes. Past treasuries of things from whispering dreams. Until I face The Second Gate. "What the Hell is this modelled on?" I whisper, staring up at the unsettling tableau. Its style, and imagery, utterly alien and unsettling. Twisted, and labyrinthine - layering detail, onto detail, onto detail. Though its message is very, very, very clear. A being of burning-bright gold - taller than skyscrapers. Its head an explosion of threads and lights. Its billion arms, woven from snakes and swooping wings, reaching down to the masses of humanity. With one hand, it mutates the left side into GMOs. With the other, it twists them into.... The figure steps down from the image. Standing still, and solid, as the gate opens behind it. Though the fronds of gold and feathery light seem to shift and twist in the corners of my eyes. Never moving, yet never ceasing..... Increasingly nervous, I slip between its spread legs to face The Final Gate. After the last two, I''m already unnerved. But they were nothing. Nothing, compared to the last. I don''t know why it scares me so much. This machine made of silver, and eyes, and ticking clockwork. Staring at me. Unblinking. A thousand rumbling gears, folding space and reality. Churning. Shifting. Eyes rotating around eyes. Folding into eyes. Shifting around eyes. Burning in the void- I swallow, and tear my own from it. Yet the world itself thrums to its ever-deepening Tick. Tick. Tick..... Beating in time to my heart. No. Forcing my heart to beat in time with it. The rhythm itself shifting from moment to moment. Building an ache inside of me that sets my teeth on edge, and forces my nails to bite deep into my palms. Tick. Tick. Tick-tick.... And then, with no warning, the gate shudders. Gears rolling across gears. Cogs sliding behind cogs, until the tower-high door simply... comes apart. Folding back into the walls on either side. Leaving me in silence, beneath a ceiling built for gods. "R-right......" My voice never echoes. Simply swallowed by the nothingess. I turn, as if to flee. Tail twitching. But I force myself forward - into a red marble basilica, higher than The City itself. Strands of silver and gold crawling up pillars as thick as skyscrapers. Building themselves into halls that roar up, and up, into the endless, dusty, dark. Arching into domes and buttresses. Into swooping galleries, and twisted geometry. As if I look upon a thing so vast that reality simply... breaks... around it. My perception twisting, wildly, until I''m unsure how large it really is at all..... And there. Right at the heart of everything. I see.... no.. I witness Polybius. The might of it weakening my knees. "Holy shit...." I whisper. "Is that....." >>><<< >> Domain Of The Machine God >> Domain Of The Machine God The weight of Power, long dormant, crushes me like bricks of lead. It tingles in my skin. My bones. My mind. Power so vast, and ancient, I feel like it could wipe me away with a thought. Forcing me to wonder if the vast gates were for its protection, or mine? I step forward, onto that intricate sheen of triangular stones. Clenching it, tight, with all my claws. As I crouch and shake beneath a great, vaulted, ceiling graven with unknown mythologies. So vast it must be thousands of miles away. Yet so clear, I know I could almost reach out and touch it. Hints of hidden colour, and swirls of mind-bending fractal, secreted within its designs.... And, beneath it..... Statues of monsters that loom without context, or explanation. A vast metal bird, like an ibex, with three great wings and three great eyes. A star made of crystal. And that same, thread-faced, being holding aloft an unknown world. An actual planet. The floor beneath inlaid with great scenes of order, and chaos, and benediction. As if telling some grand story I can''t even begin to piece together. I step between them, onto tiles that crack with filigree lines of light, and witness the monumental weight of Polybius itself. Suspended upon nothingness above eight, megalithic, pillars of spiralling wood. It is a thing so vast the word has no meaning. Ringed by radiant spirals, and esoteric signs. As if it were driven by some deep magic, not mere metal and wires. But then again, maybe it is. After all, it isn''t a machine I see. Or even a person. Polybius is terrible, void-black, sun. A star of obsidian and ink, formed from trillions upon trillions of triangles. Every angle twisted with rainbow colours that shift like crystalline bismuth. Swirling through yellow to purple and green and blue. Shedding their strange radiance across this infinite temple. Eternal, and wonderous, and- I blink, and the ink-star sunders, as if hit by some massive impact. Its surface ruptured into a corona of shards, sparkling upward from a single point. Fully ninety-nine-percent of it just flat-out gone - leaving only fragments that spit with energy, as the great statues crack and pillars fall. The ceiling broke open, unto a bottomless nothingness. A darkness without end. Its raw edges inset by massive, industrial, cogs of brass and gold that twitch and try to turn. Finally rusting to stillness. Ruins, of ruins, of ruins..... "This didn''t just bloody happen...." I whisper to a strange, draconic, statue covered in metallic fronds of ivy. "This is old news. It ain''t why I''m here....." But it begs some terrifying questions..... I take a breath, and shake the doubts away. Along with the terrible, bottomless, sensation of..... of REAL. Of this being an actual, physical, existent place. Not just some figment of Cyberspace. But it''s hard. It doesn''t feel like some paltry representation. It feels solid. It feels now and here. And way, way, more intense than anything I''ve ever felt. Another breath, and I kick off into a jog. Blurring past a dark raven, crying tears of inky oil. Past a strange flower-headed serpent, and other odd things. Coiling each step until, at last, I kick toes off the floor - and fly. Streaming tail. Eyes keen. Rising no higher than a metre as I streak to circle the expanding ruin of the spiking black sun. Slipping over to one of the pillars, and flexing a hand to psyche myself up. I''m about to do something I''ve never done before. A direct connection with Polybius itself. I know I have to do it - but I don''t have to start there. I can start with the networks The Machine Mind connects to - visualised as its few remaining pillars. If it even is a machine. Or a mind. Lightning snaps my hand as I reach out and touch the nearest. Even spirals and decorations so huge they feel perfectly flat as I send a pulse of thought into their surface. It spins out into spirals of intricate rainbow thread that carve circles, and lines, and alien symbols. Unsettling sensations crawling up my spine to touch my mind, waiting for my response. "Tower security." I hiss. "Cameras." Symbols flicker with unknowable intent. Automated functions interfacing my implant with the unconscious Polybius. Opening a flood of vScreens. And I see.... everything. Not just every room in our flat, but every room in every apartment in the tower. Some random cameras around it. Some pointed at brick walls. Gross heaps of flesh. Perfectly, eerily, ordinary hallways. Or the rotted tunnels beneath our tower. And it keeps expanding. And expanding. And expanding. A whole network I never knew existed. Towers patched to towers. Spreading a vast panopticon, centred upon Polybius.... I close my eyes, and focus it down to our own tower. Isolating the viewpoints that caught traces of movement during our sleep-cycle. That, alone, unvails a dark ecosystem. A thousand, thousand creeping..... things. A trillion vile and hideous monsters - sliming, and slithering. Five-legged Crawlers. Snarls and Jabberlings. Fantasists and Fungal Leachworms..... I shut them all down, as well. Zeroing in on a tight radius around our flat, and firing off the feed to the others. "Empty, again, mate." Zip whispers, over comms, as the hallways come into focus. And I bite my lip because, round here, that phrase has a very special meaning. You see, the Child Eater... the dead monster.... It''s gone. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it Not just the carcass. Or the bits. Everything. "The tower is hungry." I whisper. "Always." And it licks the blood off the walls. Leaving them.... utterly pristine. But that''s normal. It answers nothing. I''m not here to find our nightly clean-up crew... whatever it is. I''m here to answer a single, terrifying, question: Why the Hell is Polybius offline? I shut off the monster-camera, and rewind the others. Our bodies flowing into a comical blur of panic at absolutely nothing. Zooming about, in reverse. Yelling. Menacing the door. Then, suddenly, my cushion returns to sender - and I snuggle back into bed. The room calms. The clock ticking back, minute by minute. Glitches shifting around the tower, blacking out cameras. My eyes jolt, and I see Demon reverse out of bed at 3am - crew time. Sweating. Exhausted. He stretches, a little - then starts hammering out one-handed push-ups with endless, mechanical, fury. In total silence. I stare, as time ticks backward. Hour after hour. At 1am, Zipper wriggles up out of his beanbag bed. Shaking. Rubbing his neck. Multiple games consoles lighting up around him as he plugs in. Dropping into a kind of staring, zen-like, blankness as images flicker around him. And, still, Demon works. Never ceasing. At Midnight Zipper tears Badger out of his room, backwards, and drags him to the beanbag zone. Only for Badger to reverse-sneak to bed again, a second later. The clock spins. My sleeping form twitches. Limbs jerking. Tail coiling circles. I flip to Kami, alone in her room. Fully clothed. Staring at the ceiling. Her eyes vague. One, metal, hand reaching out. Twitching. Grasping at nothing - or, maybe, at something only she can see. As tears stream down her face. What......? I flick to Demon, still doing press-ups. Back to Kami, still staring into the ceiling. Discomfort growing. At 11:30pm, she does something to her nose, then gets up. Moping around. Listless. Demon still stuck, slamming out press-ups while horribly injured. "Jesus Christ...." Kami, now sat on her bed, erupts from it. Pacing. Suddenly angrier. Angrier. Tearing at her face. Kicking her things about. Then, suddenly, she turns to a lump of fabric jammed in one corner. Kicking it. Walking away. Kicking it again. And then she turns, and holds out one hand. The fabric erupting from its spot on the ground. Slamming her hand back, as if it were thrown. She unballs it, roughly. Furiously. Revealing..... this.. .beautiful cream and pink dress? She stares at if for a moment, then un-punches her mirror so hard the shards leap back into the frame. Turning to smooth the dress against her body, and.... smile? Twirling in front of her reflection. Playing the fabric out against herself. Lovingly. Beaming at herself. Smiling like I''ve never seen her smile. And then she folds it, so very very neatly, and packs it away into a hidden box beneath her bed. Taking time to sniff at perfumes she never wears. To run her metal fingers over pristine vials of of makeup. Blushers. Powders. Nail varnish, for nails she doesn''t have.... Then she slides it away. Looking around in terror. Checking her door is locked. Guess she forgot to kill the camera. I whisper as Demon continues his relentless. hatefilled, exercise. Sweat wicking back into his body, as he works. And works. Until, at last, he leaps upward. Stretches again, and turns to my prone body. Seeing me, sleeping. Peacefully. He reverses toward me, and my cyberspace self jerks as he untucks the blanket. Sliding me up into a loose-limbed sprawl, and returning to his side of the Sofa Nook. Where he un-notices me, returning to work on mission intel. As if he wasn''t about to knock out one of the most insane feats of endurance I''ve ever seen..... I stare at the scene. Then, up at the sleeping hulk of Polybius - who says nothing at all. "Y''knew they was suffering." My voice croaks. "You bloody saw it...." I blink tears that are somehow real, even here. "...but you.... you did bloody nothing." The obsidian nebula, shimmers. Dead, yet alive. And utterly silent. "Was it ''cause ya didn''t want to??" I snap, suddenly. "Or bloody couldn''t?" The unending temple remains wordless and still. Little more than a tomb. And I shiver. "No." I stare at my friends. "It ain''t ever that simple, is it.....?" I swallow, then swipe the screens away. Staring at Polybius. "No..... Wait..... The dreams.... The damned dreams.... They''re all about.... my family...." My lips whisper, without sound. Echoing the quiet of Polybius. "You.... tried. Didn''t ya? You tried to fix me..... But.... we never... I never listened...." The nebula retains its vast orbit. Its empty vigil. I close my eyes. "Y''wanted to bloody fix me.... But.... words ain''t ever gonna work. Are they?" I stare at my hands. "Not for this....." I touch the pillar again, and shudder. Clenching them. "Look. I don''t know how to fix you, neither. I don''t think I can." But.... you were broken when ya found us. And so was I. So were all of us. Just a handful of shards. Looking to be fixed. My finger rises, and I point up toward the damaged heart of Polybius. "I''ll find the rest of ya. I swear. I''ll fix you. But, right now.... we need what''s left. So.... I hope this bloody works...." I drift to touch each pillar. Rainbow threads of energy spreading from the impact. "Diagnostic!" I snap. And a Hellish scream of raw energy implodes to thread and roil beneath the broken morass where Polybius once lay. Threading. Rethreading. Furling and unfurling. "CEIDUS CORE INOPERATIVE." Flickers a voice so vast it slams me backwards. "Come on! I know that!" I shout back. Why are you offline! What the Hell is this!?" "PROCESSING." It jitters, colours fluttering. "PROCESSING." "C''mon! You''re a bloody supercomputer!" "FEEDBACK CASCADE DETECTED." "Explain!" I yell back. The shards flash - each spitting a billion threads to connect the others. All is harmony. Purpose. Even in the strange, broken nebula. But it''s fragile. It''s tenuous. And, very abruptly, one shard flashes red and begins to spark - corrupting its threads. Which corrupts the other shards. Which feed back onto each-other. Red dots of corruption flashing from piece to piece, until they loop right back to the first shard. Which almost explodes. Echoes of chaos rip through the network. Phantom shocks. Connections breaking, one after another, as the entire thing fails. Shutting down Polybius. Almost killing it. Plunging the temple into the void, until - at last - there is nothing but for a single blinking rune. It flickers. Almost dies. But then, part by part, the low-level systems claw back from the brink. Automated subsystems ticking back into life. Bit by bit. Until, at last, they reach out to Polybius. And fail. "RESTART TERMINATED DUE TO: ANOMALY." The subsystem states, and I feel my hope draining out of me. Because things like Polybius built this freaking system - while operating at a level far beyond this pale, broken, wreck. If it can''t resurrect itself, what hope have I? I sit, in silence, upon nothing but air. "Damage.." I whisper. "Just.... damage." But it must have happened before. Must have. And Pol must have come back from it. I take a hard breath. "No. I ain''t bloody giving up." I growl, pacing thin air a metre above the floor. "Okay. Isolate damaged nodes?" They all flash red, carved through with cracks. "NODE QUARANTINE DISABLED. ALL NODES ARE MODERATLY TO CRITICALLY DAMAGED." The thing thunders. "RESTART PENDING." "Can we.... repair it?" "REPAIR MANUALLY DISABLED." I skid to a stop. "Manually....!? Why?" The system remains silent. "COME ON! WHY?" I scream. Hammering at the pillars. But the System doesn''t respond. Leaving me grasping at straws. I draw in the slowest breath of my life. "I knew it.... I knew coming in here.... I''d have to do it myself....." I whisper, as instinct draws my eyes ever upward. One hand reaching for the distant, broken, nebula. "You''re gonna make me go.... up there..... Ain''t you?" I almost laugh. "God. I was right. No core access from the pillars." Another breath, as I shut my eyes. "Even now.... Even bloody offline..... You''re forcing me right, smack, into my bloody fears...." >>><<< >> Polybius >> Polybius The broken nebula of Polybius sparks with light, thousands of miles above me. A thing of fractured perfection, flickering with almost-life. The distance a wall like nothing I''ve ever encountered. I press towards it, and jerk myself back. Shaking. "It''s not real. Not real. Come on....." I flick off the ground, flying a few metres up. A few more. A few m- "NO! No! No! No-" I jolt back to the tiles, breathing heavily. Eyes shut. "It''s all fake. And you are NOT gonna fall." My claws clash against marble. "Damnit." I shiver. "Shit. Crap.... Fu-" Deep breaths. It ain''t real. I''m in control. Just like The Night Tyrant. I shut my eyes, and let go of the floor. Drifting upwards. Zeroing in on the origin-shard for the Cascade. It grows in my vision, until it''s the size of a cityBlock. A beautiful, perfect, crystalline, triangle threaded through with cogs and strange devices. With pulses of energy and massive, car-wide, fissures that spew strange and unsettling colours I can''t know or even describe..... "ANOMALY DETECTED." Crackles that ancient voice, as I land on its surface. Flat, on all fours. Hammerblows of Power thrumming against skin as sparks of radiant neon flick free from its surface. Bleeding slowly away, into the vast and impossible hole torn in the roof of the temple. I stare up into the sucking abyss, for a split second, and it almost breaks my mind. The sudden and hideous suction lifting me up onto my toes. Dragging toward that hole made not of inky-black space, but something deeper. Wilder. Filled with mad and malevolent things that claw the edges of visibility. Like there''s a something in there. A creature that does not exist, and yet somehow does. With billions of glassy, blind, eyes as vast as planets. Staring. Hungrily. At me. "Not real. Not real. Gotta save Polybius." I jitter, ripping my gaze away - only to find myself drifting towards that abyss. With nothing but empty air to shield me from the vast and pitiless drop. Not just to the floor, far below, but into The Pit itself. I jerk back to the shard, and latch on with every claw. Eyes shut. "Not real! Not real! I''m not gonna die! I just gotta fix this, and get out. All I need-" I yell as iridescent energies roar up around me. Rattling my claws with a fury I can''t even begin to comprehend. Mouthing words of panic as I dart toward a thing built of alchemists tubes all filled with condensed light. "Not real! Not real!" I latch onto the weird machine. Digging fingers into the churning masses of tiny brass cogs, which part and roll along my fingers. Interlacing my mind with Polybius itself, as I blurt a line from a goddamned [Hacker] movie of all things. "Reconstruct Crash Event!" The wold flashes white. And I''m stood in a hallway built of old, warm, stone. Brown, and waving. With dozens of building-tall GMO children blurring around me. Not so much kids, as the idea of them. Formless. Featureless. Seen only as hints of limb, or face. Their bodies all melted together, like shapes drawn on fog. I jolt backward. "My dream.... bloody caused this?" I spin about, and the world warps from image to image. Less a set of memories than a half-destroyed slide-show smeared with wax. It jumps to Joan''s office. Then back. Then back again. Flickering. Jammed. A frown crosses my face. And I itch my chin with skin with a hand that... ticks. My eyes snap to it, and widen. There are bright brass cogs, buried deep in the flesh. Clicking and whirring. Shining in the light. I touch them, unsure if I should scream or run or be frozen to the spot. Things whirring inside them as I turn my wrists. "That." I whisper. "Ain''t the Weirdest Shit I''ve ever seen, but it''s bloody up there." I shake off the creeping chills, and refocus. Gears clicking, and intermeshing, as I clench my hands. "Right. So. How the Hell did my stupid little-kid dream kill Polybius?" I mutter, trying not to look at my arms as I pace. It''s in here, whatever it is. And I''m starting to wonder if it was Moon. It would suit the bastard a Hell of a lot if our digital protector were crippled or killed. Assuming Polybius isn''t actually Moon- No. No. I''m not letting the paranoia back in. So what is it....? I stare at baby Tufty, in his little box. Never aging. Never changing. A moment preserved, on the cusp of forever. I reach out to it with cog-covered hands, and the image collapses into a gemstone filled with frozen time. A single instant, I all but cling to. This is how it started. A brief, precious, moment of reality in a long-forgotten dream. One of the few, scratchy, memories I had of that far back. And Polybius caught it. Enhanced it. Implanted it back into my dreams - where reality is fluid, and the mind is open. Thoughts sparking to uncover lost, and hidden, connections my waking self could never find. Must be like building towers from candyfloss in the rain. But, somehow, Polybius did it. Rebuilding the past from nothing but mist, and shadow, and threads of old memory torn free from the fluff of fiction. And maybe it''s all make-believe. Maybe it ain''t. But what it absolutely is, right here and now, is a cog in this machine of dreams. And, through it, I can feel grit in the workings - forcing the whole thing to jam "Hey!" I yell at the system, gesturing to my mote at the rest of this piecemeal dream. "This bugger''s a flat-pack, right? So c''mon! Show me what this damn dream is made of!" "ATTEMPTING TO ACTIVATE PROTOTYPE HUMAN-DREAM INTERFACE." The System thunders in the fog. "WARNING: REQUEST WILL REQUIRE PARTIALLY REACTIVATING NEURONODE 44-B." "Is that.... bad?" I blink. "That''s the node I''m inside, right?" "ACTION MAY RESULT IN PERMANANT DAMAGE TO NODE." The words slam down upon me in hammering blows. "OR TO THE USER." "SHIT!" I prowl back and forth. "Is there any other way?" Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. "PROCESSING." It repeats. Ponderously. As I pace, back and forth, across the memory of the feeling of old brown stones. "SOLUTION: CONTACT CEIDUS HIGH COMMAND." I stop. I blink. "What." I blink again. "Did.... did ya just tell me to call customer services?" The thing remains stolid. Silent. "Who is ''Ceidus'' High Command?" Even more silence. "Damnit. Is it gonna just magically come back online any time soon?" "DAMAGE TO CORE SYSTEMS: EXTENSIVE." It thrums. "ESTIMATED TIME TO RESTART: UNKNOWN." "Ho boy.... How long did it take last time?" "ONE HUNDERED AND FIFTY-EIGHT YEARS, SIX MONTHS, TWELVE DAYS, FOURTEEN HOURS-" I swallow. "So.... never." I whisper, as chills rip my spine. "Or a long, long, long time after we''re all dead....." The System ticks ever onward, as I stare up into the fog. If I ever want my friend back.... If Polybius even is a friend..... But what if this is all some insane loyalty test? A grand plan to screw with my mind? I''ve seen it before. I''ve had it done to me.... I grip my arms, and shudder. It doesn''t matter. We need Polybius, just to survive. "Do it." I whisper. A ROAR of energy spikes through the machine, ripping the mote of memory from my hand. Fractures of colour splitting the walls as terrible bells clang the depths of Hell. Node systems blinking into existence around me as gears flash to hideous speed. "PARTIAL. ACTIVATION. COMMENCING." The monstrous voice spits in a violent percussion of words as trails of energy spiral inward from the different ''parts'' of the dream. From Tufty. From the crowd. From the floor, and walls, and the window. Pouring together, into a screaming swirl of threads and lights. Building a filigree web of thoughts, strung with burning bright stars. Terrible bells clanging in the depths of Hell as the node writes around me. The migraine-inducing thing unfurls. Morphing itself into a floating sheet of crystal threads and gemstones. Flowing with power and almost-movement. Strings of power that hum and vibrate like wires. Fractures rending the air above as systems instantly fail and collapse. "HOLD ONTO IT!" I scream, knowing I''ve got not time to hesitate - or any bloody clue what I''m doing. I touch the gems, one by one, and elements of the dream flash into sharper focus. A face in the crowd. A towering window. Baby Tufty. The rabbity girl. Every gem-mote linked, by a snarl of threads, to all the others - and to things I can''t even see. Stolen thoughts, acting as triggers and links for other dreams. And- My own face looms down at me from a blast of radiant white light. Huge, and curious, and so much younger that I thought. All crowded in by warped, strange, figures..... My tiny clawed fingers gripping the edge a HUGE cardboard box..... Fingers edged with little green nails, sharp as claws. "Holy shit....! Tufty!?" The image breaks into smoke as I jerk back my hands. "Tufty....? What.... He remembers too??" I choke. "We were both.... both dreaming the same thing....." But my eyes narrow as realisation kicks the door in. "And Polybius doctored our memories. Glued em together." The System stutters, and the world begins to break. Cogs sawing through my arms, like bloody blades, as feedback smacks me deep in the skull. But I have to do this. I have to ignore the damn warnings, and think my way through it. To trace the snarl of livid-green threads that bend and combine with my own. Binding my dream with Tufty''s. "But why?" I whisper, to nobody. "What''s so bloody special about-" The chaos slams into my skull again, fuzzing the edges of my vision. "WARNING: NODE STRUCTURE UNSTABLE." Blares the voice of the system as darkness flecks the edge of my vision. "EMERGENCY SHUTDOWN-" "Don''t you bloody dare!" I scream, pawing through memories as fast as I can. Tufty only has three memory ''moments'' - even if that''s a heck of a lot for a baby. Him in the box. Being held in Joan''s office. And- I yelp as the final crystal blasts a blazing-hot bolt of violence jolts up my arm. My whole body jerking from the sheer force of it. "There! The Anomaly! That has to be it!" I jitter and hiss. "System! What the bloody Hell was that!?" "HAS SUFFERED- WARNING- CEIDUS NEURONODE- FEEDBACK- CORE-" The system dissolves into a tsunami of blaring noise and shattering light. The subsystem winking clear out of my awareness, as all of its systems fail. And die. Burning out. Breaking. "No." I whisper. Because, if I don''t fix this, Polybius is not coming back. My mind sharpened with panic, I spin back to the shimmering dream interface. Fractures splitting my skin as gears flash across flesh like tiny circular saws. Blinding me with pain. They''re ripping free. They''re leaving me, as the system collapses. Polybius itself dying, as tiny baby Tufty flickers between the box and Joan''s arms - over and over and over. The walls bleeding shapes that cannot exist. That have no place in reality. Their very image burning my fragile little mind. Symbols that seem almost like.... language. "What the Hell is this memory?" I choke, as the gears rip through one of my eyes. The pain a distant song as numbness spreads across my face. "How the freaking shit could Tufty break freaking Polybius?" I snatch at the crystal again, and my left arm simply explodes. Gore and flesh spinning off into nothing, as I scream and shake in the numbness that follows. Holy shit. This is real. If I don''t fix this, I''m gonna die too.... "Why!?" I beg nobody, as Dreamspace begins to implode. Fighting to even stand, as digital noise crawls down my legs like blood. But I get nothing back. I breathe deep and hard. My mind, or what''s left of it, focused on the shining green gem of memory in front of me. The one linking my past to that instant in Joan''s study. What the Hell was it I was trying to remember- Where Tufty came from. That''s the memory. That''s what it is. There was an instant in the hallway. I was bouncing my lil rubber bally, though Joan said I wasn''t meant to. Not near the big crystal windows. And I saw. I saw something. Something.... not right. Something not real. But what? What was it? All I have is the last, ghostly, feeling- I shake off the thought. "Not now! C''MON!!!!" I reach again for the crystal, and this time I know what to do, as the dark crawls out of my left eye - into my right. I ignore the damn crystal, and cleave its connections with a single claw. Ripping it free of the intricate, cats-cradle, of threads. "There!" I yell as everything warps and shrinks around me. Buckling under the sheer force of the collapse. "That has to be it! Right? That has to be it!?" But the failure blares brighter. Madder. Wilder with every moment. Carved apart by exploding gears that shear through my legs, and rip them away. My body consumed by a numbness that eats, and eats and eats toward my head. And outside, somewhere, I know my brain is probably cooking in my skull. But I have to- I have to- My remaining hand snatches the white-hot memory, and ruptures in a flicker of corruption. Fractured images exploding through my skull. Incomprehensible. Incalculable. Indescribable, and wrong. So twisted, and broken, my mind flinches away from them. But I know one thing, so suddenly It hurts. "That ain''t Tufty''s memory." I whisper, eyes widening. "Or mine." And my eyes snap to the thread I never saw. A connection that could only, only, exist if there was a third person WITH US in that hallway. A person who should not have been there. Could not have been there. Yet was. My teeth lash out toward that last glitching, burning, stuttering connection. A thread built of numbers and triangles, leading directly to the dead and shattered memories..... ....of Polybius itself. Memories lodged in the most damaged, decayed, and unstable parts of its mind. Clinging to the edge of oblivion. Fragments it swore it could never, ever, touch.... or else shatter its own mind. I latch onto the twisting thread, even as cascading errors blot my darkening vision. Broken cogs erupting from the inside of my mouth, as I scream and BITE. Lightening flashes between my teeth. And the world blurs to dark, as the connection fails. The last moments of my mind reeling with terrible implications. Because if Polybius created this mad experiment, linking my mind to Tufty''s.... and our minds to its own.... There''s no hope in Hell that it was an accident that brought us together. "How....." I whisper, as my mind shatters. "How were you there?" My eye closes onto darkness, as I dissolve. Seeing only that hallway. And wondering..... What did we see? Because.... somehow.... I know.... ....we witnessed something.... ...utterly.... .....impossible..... >>><<< >> From Dreams, To Dust >> From Dreams, To Dust I plunge tinto chaos as my mind burns alive. Damned voices whispering from the void beneath, as if drunk on their own destruction. Cables and wires dragging me down. Down. Down. Drowning me in dark oceans that have never known life. But in those abyssal depths, it finds me. A stone leviathan carved by an eldritch god - burning with lightless and unfathomable colours. With great iron fins, graven with terrible symbols of gold. With pictograms, and runes. All roiling with mayhem and fiery darkness. Its mouth opens wider than towers, and I am gone. Drifting in nothingness, as fingers of rock pluck at the dark. Returning torn chucks of my body from the deeps, and welding them together with flashes of burning violet. Polybius....? I shut my eyes, and the dream of dark melts into blinding light. I''m little again. Chasing down old stone halls, after a giggly little Badger, with the hot weight of tiny Tufty clinging to my shoulder. Held on by one hand. The image blurs, and, twists - and suddenly he''s bigger. Two shy little emerald eyes. Two sharp little paws. All peeping over my leg as I fuss and bounce a squealing Badger. "Come on! You can come up too!" My dreamSelf cheers, and I hoist the shrinking cat into the pile. Hugging them both extra tight. Joy and light burn through me in waves, and I clutch the memories of happiness to my heart. The instant blending with a thousand others. Scribbling on paper! Scribbling on Tufty! Painting a sky we''ve never-ever-ever seen.... All of those instants curling into that one, until..... A sharp little noise. A sharp little breath. A golden eye, framed in the doorway. Wild, and wide, and fantastically afraid. But staring at me. Almost.... hungry. I sit up, suddenly, gripping tight my two adopted brothers. But he''s gone in a flash of ratty old hood and matted gold hair. Leaving only a flick of leonine tail. "Ah! What was that??" Yeeps a shrill little serpentine creature that begins to exist only as I hear it. Knocking over a messy boadgame as it coils itself up in jittering circles! Six tiny wings furling and unfurling along a glittering scaled body as it twists to stare at the doorway. "Did you see that!?!" "It were da ghost!! Da boogie!" Trills a second, far younger, dragon with a butterfly in its hair. Birdlike paws clutching a stuffie bear to its fangy face. Fading into being, beside the board. "Ghosties!?!" Squeaks a third, even tinier, GMO serpent. Dropping the game-piece it was nibbling to cover its six, dark, eyes. "Nuuuuuu!" "Hush now...." Cautions a grown-up voice, and the scene takes sudden form around us. Stone walls erupting, from nothing. Lining themselves with hide-bound books on old wooden shelves. Fitting themselves in, amongst strange brass machines, all filled with gyroscopes and tubes and carefully carved crystals. Every object arranging itself to frame a bearded old man, leaning elbows on a huge, dark oak, desk spread with papers. "Dad.....?" I breathe. Not in memory, but in life. Reaching ghostly hands toward him. "...Joan....." But the dream snaps my focus back toward the door. My babyish lil ears twisted and tilted by fearful little breaths. By scuffles of coat and shuffles of feet - and a fast-beating heart. My tail all coiling up round my legs. But Joan doesn''t get up. Instead, he looks at me. I jerk a hand from the thick rubbery band locked to my arm, and swallow. But then I nod - displacing a wobbly Badger onto the sofa. "No. No he''s proper scaredie of you!" I whisper, as the lil dork tries to climb on back. "You wait here, okies?" "POOOK!" He babbles. "Gonna help!!" But I shush him down. Hugging Tufty to my chest like a stuffie as I slip to the door. Pressing my breath to its gaps. "S-Sebeastian?" I whisper, and the boy who would become Demon lets out a little frightened gasp. "Um!? You w-wanna come in?" I flick a look back as Joan rises, swiftly, to corral the pack of tiny dragons into the side room. The one that only sometimes exists in my dreams. "Sebastian?" Tufty''s pointy lil ears twitch as we hear him breathing, just out of sight. My tiny kitty peeping up at me, all small and unsure. "Mine...." My future self whispers. "Is that how I thought?" But my past self swallows, and the huge medieval door gains sudden detail as I reach for its huge black-iron handle. Wood and metal burning away, as the dream shifts again. Days passing, in an instant, as I step through into- The hallway shatters and reforms. Memories shifting. Days blurring as I turn to face a very different door set between very different pillars. It''s a thousand years newer - all brassy hinges, and GMO kids clamouring around it! With lil nosies peeking through the gaps! And trying super-duper hard to be quiet! "Poook! Pook!" Badger flops down behind me, his stumpy legs all done. "Hey, not my fault you can''t keep up!" I giggle, but the ''oohs'' and ''ahhs'' from the door keep twiddling my ears! So I sneak in closer, and listen to their whispers! "I can''t see! I can''t see!" "Is eee hooman??" Burbles a squishy black fox-creature with eyes of faceted amethyst. "Dunno!" Chirps a scaly thing with a flicking in-and-out tongue. "Who is it?" I whisper. Sneaking up behind them, with Badger in my arms - and Tufty right behind. "It''s dat new boy!" Says the fox in its chirpy voice. "I dink ee''s..... hooman!" A big baby huff. "Eeee dunt even have wings or nothing!!! " "Shhh! It''s bad to spy!" I hush, barging them aside. "Now, lemmie look!" I put my eye to the crack, and it explodes with flickers of strange imagery. The room is bright. Golden with light. A row of beds set up in a long stone hall, with medical things in big wooden cabinets. A boy sat, huddled, on a bed with vivid blue hair covering his face. The nurse touches his arm, and slowly he takes off his shirt and it rips from his skin like a plaster. The inside dark and red. Then he''s sitting backwards on a chair - breathing quietly, but hard, as the nurse dabs smelly antiseptic on his brutalised back. Every inch of skin clawed and mangled beyond all recognition. Yet he only clenches as she works. He never makes a sound. His his face still obscured by mounds of shining, bright-blue, hair..... "Zipper....?" I whisper, stepping back. "I don''t remember this....." "....blood leaking through his pyjamas. I don''t understand it at all." The nurse says, to a shadow of ink behind her. "He was improving last week, but now every cut has reopened and it''s all infected again." "Every cut?" Joan says. "Exactly the way it was before?" Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. "That''s what I said." The nurse snaps, frustration burnt into every word. "It''s as if we hadn''t treated it at all. Which is almost impossible." "Why don''t I remember this?" I echo. "No. And we put mittens on his hands. It isn''t him." She drops the swab into a dish, and picks up another. "Something very, very strange is going on. I feel-" "There is, perhaps, something we can try-" Joan reassures her, and terror roars up through me. My tail spiking with terror as I grab at Badger''s little hand, and run. "No. No. I ain''t supposed to be here! I can''t-" The door follows me, like a living thing. But I kick it backwards, into ink. Its edges rattling with blinding bright light as it burns away the walls. The ceiling. Flames of white, edged with darkness and nothingness. Consuming everything. I run, and Badger falls to dust behind me. I yell for him, and the ground turns red. Red and silky as blood. With dreams of luxury and wealth rising, mountain high, around me as I push through the crowds of an indoor market. "No..... No not this, neither!!" My breath catches, and I fall to my knees between the ghosts of mile-high gods. But I snatch at the fabric of reality, and tear it apart. Refusing to allow the evil memories to claim me. Breathing hard, I focus my mind. Because I am in control. My hands rise, and vast trees burst forth from shopfronts and alleyways. Ripping the ground with roots, and tangling the ruins with their tresses. Flooding the dreamworld with torrents of rich soil that curl up beneath me. Cupping me in their embrace. I close my eyes as claws sink deep into dust, and all the moss and leaves of the forest flow down around me. Filing me with the memory of softest soil, and moss, as I curl within my hidden bower. Ignoring the eerie mesh of triangles sliding and folding in the air beside me. Silent, and ever watchful. "Hey. Guess you''re back, huh?" I whisper, as strange plants braid themselves around my tail. My emotions twisting, just as strangely. One moment happy, the next angry at my own odd joy. "Damn, but it got wild back there. Right at the end. You all in one piece?" "No." The Machine Mind rumbles in its metal monotone. "When neuroNode 44-B detonated, your mind broke under the trauma." "Detonated?" I stutter as my face twists, jaw dropping open. Dismissing everything else it said. "Shit. We lost it?" "Correct." It concludes, as hundreds of triangles meld and unmeld. "Two subsystems were destroyed completely, leaving no record of your entry. Nor of what you did." Numbers flicker as images paint on the air. "The ramifications of this are still being processed." "I.... almost killed you. Didn''t I?" I whisper, blinking slow tears. "You meant me no harm." It states, without emotion. "That..... that ain''t the point....." I trail off, blinking quietly as the thing remains utterly silent. "Ain''t you..... mad at me?" "No." It ticks to itself for a moment, and I raise an eyebrow at it. "You ought to be." I growl, in a tone to brooks no argument. "I bloody crippled you! I gave ya bloody brain damage!! You got a right to hate me!" But the machine remains silent and cold. Reforming, even now, before my very eyes. And a sudden spike of pure, alien, rage hammers through me. "Come on! Bloody yell at me! Or..... or somethin''!" I drop my arms, as ivy burns to sand and mist around me. Trailing off into the void, along with all I created. Little more than dust. "Please." "I am merely disquieted. Due to a number of factors." It states, in that same perfect monotone. "Not least, that I was neutralised so abruptly by an AI which I created." "That ain''t as bad as what I did." I plead, as remorse jams through me. "Come on! You could''a come back. Eventually....." "Do you wish for me to hate you?" "No.... Kinda. You oughta. I deserve it." I admit, feeling like a little kid. Dreams of baby Tufty dusting across my lap as broken triangles glitch, and twist, and jutter above. Memories of baby Badger gawping up at them in awe. "It disturbs me, far more," The thing says in the same blank tone. "to have a child risk death forcing access my Core Mind." Sudden images of my team flick into being around me. Zipper and Kami pulling me from the cupboard. Stripping my armour. Fighting to revive me. "Shit. Stop it.... You know I''d...." I shut my eyes. I breathe out. Sudden grief splashing through me, like icey waters. "It don''t matter if I die. Y''know. Cause.... they ain''t gonna bloody survive without you. And they ain''t gonna miss-" "Cease this." It states, in a shock of authority I''ve never heard from it. "Do not devalue your own life. Spook. It contains immeasurable meaning." "Even to you?" I hiss in such wild, blind, rage my tail mutates into an actual snake. Vividly green as it roils its rings of poisoned death around me. Rising to strike. "I do not know." Polybius admits, and the illusion burns away like so much air. "Humanity is abstraction to me. It is chaos." The thing ticks and churns. Ever growing. Ever building. "This is why I seek your dreams. To understand what ''mind'' is. To see it. To weigh it. To divide it, mathematically, into its component parts." It intones. "And to, therefore, know if I posses one. Or if I am but mere code. Mere chemistry, and algorithm." "You''re one of us. Either way." "Am I?" It inquires. "What if I am merely an unthinking device? Such as your implant? Cleverly designed, but no more than a machine pretending it is alive?" "You seem pretty damn thinky to me." I counter. "More than most bloody people." "Many unthinking things do. Many AIs, and toys, and carefully made puppets." It disagrees. "It is the manifold irony of humanity. Their desire to be tricked, and their rage at being fooled." "You''re still crew." I multiply my arms as I fold them - mimicking Kami''s spiky blockade of elbows. "You hold then close, even as you push them away." The thing notes again, striking to the very heart of me. "But know this: If you die, your friends will mourn. They will cry. But they will not survive." I grab my head as the emotions pound and scream and kick as the inside of my skull. "Whatever." I snarl. "They''re smart. They''re fast. They''re-" "Spook-" "Save it! If ya ain''t gonna wax me, I got a mission to run!" I roar. Then choke, Then shudder. "Wait..... Why..... why am I so.... mad at you? What''s goin'' on??" "Please remain calm." My eyes widen, and snap to the video. "Wait. Wait. If I''m okay, why am I still in here...?" I leap to my feet, and then into the air. Trees and towers bursting up, and up, around me. "I''m still dreamin''....? Why am I still dreamin''.....?" "I am sorry. Spook. I am keeping you in semi-sedated state to protect your mind." The machine says, without empathy or grace. "You are falling in and out of deeper cycles of sleep as I bring you back from the coma." "My..... my what.....?" I start to panic. "Shit! How long-" "Two days." It states, in quiet calm. "You may perceive this as a linear conversation, but-" "What..... What the Hell....?" I choke, trying to think back. "The same feedback that destroyed neuroNode 44-B recoiled into you." It continues, as if pushing to finish a pre-prepared statement. "Had I been awake, I would have prevented it. But I was not." "No...." I whisper. It''s all I can manage. "Your mind broke." Stutters the machine in the dark, as a single blade-like... thing erupts from behind it. Glittering with digital noise. Gears sliding free from its surface. Beginning to tick. "Scans indicate some form of damage to your implant." It clicks to itself. "You will need to replace it." "Shit." I hiss, realising what''s next. "There may also be cognitive damage, localised around the implant." It adds, with a terrifying force of inevitability. "Your friends have expended most of your supply of neuro-weave nanites to counteract this. I believe they have been successful." "H...how bad...." I croak, in a tiny little voice. "...is it?" "I estimate that in four hours your mind will be mostly functional. In about twelve more, you may be ready for active duty." It indicates, to my shrinking relief. "However, Kami has is warned me that you might not survive this long." "What....?" I whisper. "What!? Why!?" "Because she intends to murder you." The thing says, and I almost imagine the twitch of the lip. Or maybe a triangle. "She provided some extremely graphic, and extremely improbable, suggestions on how she might go about it." "Yeeep....." I almost giggle. "So. Uh. The coma thing. Is that still an option here?" "Increasingly no. You are about to wake up." "Shit. It''s been twelve hours already?" "Correct. It is noon, according to your team''s personal clock." I draw a breath. "Alright then. I guess I should start plannin'' my bloody funeral." "Amongst other things." The machine ticks for a second, as more and more parts seem to flow in from outside it. Building a mesh of bladed wings and towers. "However." It adds. "There is one final thing I feel I must ask. While you are unable to run away." Mountains of numbers shimmer in its clockwork eyes. "How were you able to access my Core?" It states with something almost on the edge of an emotion no human could ever comprehend. "When I have never granted you permission?" I blink. "You.... uh. Kinda left it hangin'' wide open." "No." It states. "I did not." "No, I''m serious it just-" "My systems treat sudden shutdowns as an attack. Locking down all entry." It states as gears edged with blades arise from the complex workings. "Only an admin-level user should have been able to gain access." "What......? C''mon. That''s gotta be wrong. Y''must have given me the pass..... Or maybe ya subsystems thought I looked....." I stutter off in the quickening moments before awakening. Squinting up at the strange machine, as new realisation blooms. "Wait..... Are you..... gettin'' bigger?" "Correct." It states, with mechanistic clipitude. "I''m afraid that is your fault." "What." I blink. "Wha''d''ya mean-" Which is about as far as I get before Kami reaches right into my cosy, comfortable, darkness and hauls me out by the goddang ear. >>><<< >> Ruck Up, And Rock Out >> Ruck Up, And Rock Out Two hours later......
## News Scraper :: [Connection Established] to [Polybius API] ## .... ## News Scraper :: Special Keyword [Omega 9] has been flagged [49] times in location [GMO Enclave of Highwing]
SPECIAL ALERT: The new GMO Enclave of Highwing was rocked by fresh scandal last night, after leaked documents unveiled the true agenda of the Garuda Safety Commission. The memos.... uploaded by a [Hacker] team calling itself ''Omega 9'', contained quotes such as ''Hatred will exist as long as humanity exists. Therefore humanity must cease to exist.''. Highwing''s Official ''Fact Checker'' service have slammed the memo as forgery. However; our own....." ''The New Hindi'', Neodine (a news service popular with humans fleeing the new government of Highwing)
Politics: ....The so-called No Crime, Never Again Act heralds a brave new age of justice & safety. Starting next month, the now-routine installation of AI enhanced behaviour guiding chips into newly born citizens will no longer be optional. Experts claim such chips are a ''final solution'' to the problem of crime. The Electric Poet, New London (AI owned & controlled news service)
A terrifyingly cheery *bing* cracks the silent dark of a long-dead hallway, followed by the snap of golden claws gripping the edge of a metal door. The lift stutters as I jam my SMG through the gap - into the long, deep, silence of the void. Its tiny camera tracking across musty pictures and brassy lights. I motion, quickly, and Zipper tosses a handful of tiny plastic toys out onto the vivid red carpet. Kami rattling the close button, fast as she can, while Demon and me force it shut. Okay. Go. I nod, and his eyes flicker with tiny dancing lights as yellow-striped bee-bots untangle. Rising, as one, on a puff of dust. Tiny wings rattling a metallic humm against the static of mics turned up too high. Demon shifting, uncomfortably, near my knees - horns banging my armoured thigh as I train my gun at the door. Gremlin a bug-eyed lump of scaly excitement on his shoulder, spinning about and pricking his face with her claws to make him jump. Which gets her doing that evil, excited, little whole-body wiggle of hers.... "And us all trapped in a tiny metal box." I growl as Kami plants a firm, titanium, hand on the web of rags tied to the baby GMO''s glistening armour. Pushing her butt back down. Her own uncovered, and gleaming. But she''s alone in the lift. The rest of us cloaked. Wrapped. Even our helmets, tucked deep under hoods - just in case. We''re about to enter a Pirate hunting-zone, after all..... "Spookiesss-" The scaly red thing whispers. But I put claw to lips as the vScreens waver with static. Dark rooms shifting as Zipper puppets his swarm. Crossing paths. Cutting through broken-walls, and barricades. Analysing the torn relics of the long-long-gone..... Clear. He mutters every so often, breaking that nauseous quiet. "Clear...." The rest of us sit there and wait, with cold guts and shivering glances. Kami glaring holes in the roof-access panel, tapping metal fingers like a cold-iron drip. Demon stoic and silent, as Gremlin climbs on his horns. Tufty clung tight to his tail. Eyes shut. Mumbling so quietly not even GMO ears can hear him. And, God, how I wish I could do anything to break the tension. I''ve got all kinds of movies, apps, games, on my hacked Implant. I could start up ''Delver'' and disappear. Just me and my gnomes, burrowing the dark for glittering gems. But I''ve seen what happens to the distracted and blind..... ....when you''re delving in the dark.... for real. So. I focus on my loadout, instead. Checking the last few details.
LOADOUT - SPOOK
Armour :: LMG ''Dominion 5'' Exoskeleton
WEAPONS
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 220/220 Mode :: [Shotgun] Alt Fire :: [Burst] Spare Mags :: 4/4
LMG Executioner Pistol :: 14/14 Mode :: [Single Shot] Spare Mags :: 4/4
LMG Issue Combat Knife
GRENADES
  • 2x Frag - Explosive, Concussive
  • 2x Stun Powder - Paralytic
  • 4x Flashbang - Reusable
  • 1x ''Destroyer'' - Coded Annihilator Field
  • 1x Sensor Blocker
OTHER KIT
  • Field Medic Satchel (Basic)
  • Infiltrator Toolkit (Basic)
  • 3x Mini Flares
Zip lets out a sharp hiss, and I snap back to the vScreens. Shit, Spook. Like.... You should see this thing. He whispers, and we all crowd the tiny virtual display. Kami makes a disgusted noise, and backs off. I swallow back terror, and take a quick glance. Tufty shrinking behind me as umber chitin gleams in the dim light. Coiled, and quiet, and ready. "Ambusher. Whatever it is...." Yeah. looks, like...." He swallows. "Like its only one in there. But holy shit. I shake my head, checking my gun so I dont gotta look again. Sure it''s the easy way out? Zip breathes out, kinda shaky. Y-yeah, mate. So I crick my neck, and flick a touch along my grenades. "Let''s go." Man. And we advertise as rock-hard monster killers. Kami sighs as she presses the button. Prompting a second ding, as we slide out into the dusty silence. Low and ready, as dead apartments slide on by. One door, two, three, four. There. We flank the locked-open security door, and peer inside it. Shit. There it is. Hideous bastard. I whisper as the lights twitch over a silent, twisted husk. Four huge eyes, wide apart. Green body. Eight massive forelimbs ending in nasty, thorny, hooks. "Dead?" Kami murmurs, hopefully, peering up into the huge and horribly papery eyes. Compound-lenses glittering gently. "Weird how nothing''s eaten it....." "Or the bones." I mutter as we clink our way through the dead, to the tangled hulk. Propelled by quiet steps, a lack of sense, and morbid curiosity. Like, damn - thats even freakier up close. Zip shakes, jittering the barrel of his snubby SMG. I mean, like - whys. whys it gotta be so grabby. Yknow? Like it''s gonna hug you right up to its.... We stare at the multi-bladed mouth. Licking our own lips. Right up until I rip my pistol from under the rags. Blooms of fire rolling from its sides as I put a rocket-rail slug right through that unholy face. Cracking the dry shell to flakes and bits. Se step back, kicking bits of empty head away and shuddering. Relief glimmers - it really is dead. But then I let out a long breath, and stare a little closer. "Oh no." Well. If its pretending, its real bloody good at it. Kami laughs. Cmon. "Wait....." I reach out, very carefully. Claw-nudging one of the fragments. Lifting and tilting my pistol''s camera, without getting closer, to peer into the hole I shot. "...oh ....shit. It''s a molt." "What?" "Shell''s empty!" I hiss, twisting sharply. "Bastard shed its skin! Reel creeper''s still in here! Usin'' it as a decoy!" Their eyes widen. Snapping around us. "Shit..... Shit..... Nice big hole over there." "Back out." I breathe. "Back out, slow....." We slip to the doorway, and Zipper jacks into the panel. "Hold on, mate." "Zipper!" "Hold on! Like...." His eyes flicker with lights as my eyes flare at the molted skin. "Did that-" "Move!" Kami yells, and we slam out into the hallway. Zipper slapping the plate of the lock with a keycard. "Good- Good-bye [ERROR]." It stutters, loudly, and the stirring darkness grows a limb. The door jerking, stuttering, sticking as we force it shut on whatever abomination lies within. Sealing it away forever. "In bloody retrospect." I growl in deflected terror, as Kami sprays a red X on the door. "If there''s a bloody ambush inna bloody flat, we lock it first." "Ah. Yeah, mate. Hahah....." "Some bloody monster-hunters we are." Kami sighs. "We going or what?" I motion, and we creep onward. Soft dust stirring around our toes to make us cough. I slot on my magnetic breather and suck in fresh air. Adding a tiny click-click of valves to the eerie, unsettling, quiet. The monster, behind us, a silent weight of madness. Itching the back of my mind with many-jointed limbs. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it. Or. Maybe. Maybe we just imagined that reaching shape.... We hit the fire-escape at the end of the second hall - right at the corner. Zipper starts sealing nearby flats. Me and Demon covering separate halls while Kami flips open the mechanism - literally a big red button - and starts tinkering. Rewiring the alarm with rubber-tipped fingers. Pol cant do this - its hardware, not software. I lean into the corner, eyes moving. Tufty a tiny shiver of green, right by my ankles. "Hey." I nudge him. "Get tough, catbutt. Y''look like a tasty takeaway." "Um.... That''s w-what I''m worried about...." "So get tough." I repeat. "Or get on a plate, and cover y''self in ketchup." "Catsup." Kami snickers, not looking round. "Think of it like this." I continue, eyes flicking down. "You gonna make that face when every bloody thing ya care about''s on the line? Or are ya gonna get mean? Are ya gonna show em?" Tufty gulps, hard, gripping tight to my tail. His own a spiking mess of floof. But then he lets go. Takes a breath. And nods. Once. Very quickly. "Good." I mutter, slicking another look down that hallway full of busted doors. And clawed walls. And rags of clothes. And. Yeah, I was trying to bloody ignore that. Got it! No, arrgh! Don''t got it! Kami growls. Okay! Now! Done! Let''s go. I breathe, and she slams the button - bolts klunking back into the doorframe. Quarantined air escaping with a dull hiss as the pressure changes. We jam in shoulders, and begin pushing it open. Faint neon ghosting down through the growing gap as fallen rubbish grinds against it. Overcome, bit by crushing bit, as we slowly break free. Building our new way out of The Tower. Fat drops of darkness flick down to tap at the concrete box beyond. Vast gusts of wind hammering at metal and glass, high above. Very high above. The stairs here were metal - and collapsible. Meant to deploy only in an emergency. Which would be great if they weren''t gone for about five floors in that direction. Leaving only a vertical pit of angles and rusted spikes that makes my spine twitch. Not the best door out. Not the worst. But it''s better to climb up, or a jump over a great big gaping hole At least to me. Raging hypocrite that I am. We wait for Kami to stuff her boots on, and clomp out to run her scans. Check the bolts. And, my preferred test, to jump up and down furiously and see if the floor stays where it''s meant to. Finally she turns to give me the nod. "Never trust a trick floor. I growl glaring at it as I step out. Slow and careful. Testing my weight on the long row of folded metal plates set into the floor - the collapsed stairs themselves. Their dimpled surface cool and gritty with rust beneath my skin. Shifting, ever so slightly. But never quite enough to make me jump. Slowly, I press down. Harder. Then, with all my weight. One hand on the doorway. "Ready?" Kami drawls. "One sec." I mutter. Giving it another push. And another. Finally giving up in the face of those tapping fingers. "Rrr. Alright. It aint trying to murder us, at least." I flick my eyes around the low balcony. Its windows torn out long, long, ago - before any of us were born. The holes blocked up with corrugated sheets. Like maybe, years ago, this little box was some guys whole house - with a tarp for a roof, a few rags, and probably a bucket. But now theres nothing but a gnawed skull. A few bones. I cross to the window - our preferred exit - and worm my pistol-camera between the metal panels. Darkness resolving, quickly, into a solid metal floor. A bedframe doing service as a wall. Another little slum-dwelling out of billions. Looks good. No people - not for decades. But.... My camera shifts, and I find the missing wall. And the vast, bitter void of a pit so deep and jagged I hiss. Fangs flickering. Shiiiit. I stagger back into the tower. "What? Shit? Monsters?" Kami blinks as my breath stutters. "Saw movement." I lie, to cover my shame. "Something.... nasty....? Dunno what." They trade a look. And I know they know what this is really about. Bee cam? Zip ask, hopefully, as dozens of the tiny things boil up around him. Staring at me with hundreds of little dark eyes. "That." Kami declares. "Is creepy AF." He winces. "Like, for serious?" Her arms clang as she plants hands. "No jokes. Serious time. How many can you see out of at once?" "Well, like, all of-" "Just get it done, Zip." I interrupt, and they wince a little. Zip shifting to flick one right out the door - its wings catching, mid air, as it zooms under the metal sheet. Tiny, stripy, bot-butt wiggling furiously. Zip makes a ''pop'' sound, and it zings inside. Rapidly circling the dark interior as it builds us a live 3D model. But something is wrong. Very wrong. It flutters, and crackles, and jitters as the others examine it. The side of my head beginning to heat, as if by some internal flame. I tap at my implant, and frown. Hey, mate. Look there." Zip spins the view about, images garbling and twisting together. Forcing me to shut my eyes and turn away. Pricked ears shifting as I focus. A low, steady, scrape.... beneath the clanking mass of metal. Rustling. Crinkling. Jingling. Tap. Click. Tap. Clang..... Wow. What the freshly fried frick is that thing?? Kami snarks, jerking me from my trance. Zip beams at me. "Hey! You were right, mate! Got us some, like, real uggos hanging from the bars up there.! "Oh. Goody." My ears flatten. Right. But, again, what is that?" Kami pokes the image. "Can you see how many? Doesnt look like any GMOs or Gone Wrongs I ever saw. I frown. "Multiples? Think they escaped from a lab?" Mate. Like, who even knows where this shit comes from? Zip grimaces at the jerking model. Right. But how many, y''reckon? I repeat, trying not to look at the thing. Dunno." He sucks breath. "Looks like a horde, mate. Bloodsuckers, maybe. Tufty moans. Hands flattening his kitty ears as he hunkers down hard. Please just be bat GMOs. Big, friendly- "Careful what you wish for." Kami grunts. "Bats are smart." "I guess, mate." Zip smirks. But then his pierced lip twitches. "Hey! It''s basically hid in a big tin tower, right? How bout we nip back for Badger, on the down-low? Let him ''give it a go''?" Kami winces, and I snort under my breath. "Oh yeah. Mister Ooops I Demolished The Wrong Bloody Building Again would bloody love that. Hah. Yeah. "Okay. I''m gonna say it." Kami glances at me. "We can''t get through that, whatever it is, so we better get climbing." I jerk my eyes up at her. "Climb-?" I start. "You knew we might have to." She counters. "Come on. What did you just tell Tufty?" My face twitches. "Don''t you dare-!" "Call you a hypocrite? Come on! You''re the leader! So, lead!" She pushes past me, pistols unlimbered. Eyes beady. "Kami!" I start again, eyes flicking to Zip - whose many eyes snap suddenly away. One hand rubbing, fretfully, at his neck. "Uh, hey, like, yeah...." "Come on." Kami calls. "It''s not far up. We''ve just got to grapple." I take a slow, utterly unwilling, breath, but force myself forward. "Okay. Secure the door. Lets go." After all - if I can tell Tufty to do it, maybe I can face my own fears too. Tufty darts out after Demon, and our teks move like fluid. Zipper slapping alarm sensors and cameras on the slab of the fire-escape door. Kami leaning it shut, and scattering trash. And Demon.... Demon takes a flying leap up into the dark hole above. Kicking toes off one wall, then another, as Gremlin mirrors him. Grabbing the edge of the balcony three whole floors above and hauling up. Our little red monstery-girl cheerfully hitting every step a second after him. Then adding a few more for luck. I can barely look at it. "You next." Kami''s voice is soft, but her gaze is hard. Tilted, thankfully, down. "Um.... umm....." Tufty wilts backward, ears low. "W-what if it comes through the wall?" "Same old." Kami''s grin never reaches her eyes. And her eyes never leave Tufty. "If its friendly, we say ''hi''. If it isnt-" her guns make a nasty noise "-we say ''bye''. He gulps, and steps back further. Then makes a mad, tail-lashing, rush at the wall. Hits it, with a foot, and rebounds. Springing from side to side as he zooms all the way to the top - with a ''pat'', ''pat'', ''pat'' - grabbing Demon''s outreached hand. The kid swings as he''s hauled, and his foot-claws bang metal. Then he slips up, and over the edge. Peeking down at us shyly. Demon astride the edge, with Gremlin, right beside him. For a moment, the world strings tight with tension. Everybody staring at the metal wall. Nothing..... Nothing.... A shuffling. Snuffling of awareness..... And, very slowly, we relax. "C''mon. Boost me. I wanna try it." Zip says, after altogether far too long. "You-? Y''think ya can?" "Mate! Hey! What''s that look, like? I''m bloody awesome!" He grins, hawking two thumbs at himself. "You think I can''t jump coz, like, I''m ''just'' a demi? C''mon! A human could parkour that, if they really put it in." He can try, at least. He''s got grapples. He''s not a stupid looser who''s afraid of heights, like me..... I nod, and cup hands. Zip grins, backing up. "Launch in T-minus-" "Just go!" I hiss, and he hurls himself at me. Lengthways, down the balcony. Rough, tough, skin hits my hands - and I hurl him upward. The kid pulling an actual, freaking, honest-to-God flip to land on the opposite wall. Bounding off it - and up. Eating most of the distance in a single, freaking, bound. He hits the floor of the balcony, two stories above, and leaps again to grab Demon''s hand. "Easy! GG!" "Dang." I blink. Rubbing off my fingers. Kami just snorts. "Bloody posers." And then, in a voice meant only for me: "Be the bloody leader." "What?" I blink. But she fires a wrist-grapple up at the ledge - and yawns, decadently. Leaning backwards in the air as she''s reeled on up - like a limp doll. Finally, cheerfully, slapping Demon''s hand aside - only to struggle and swear her way over the edge of the balcony. Slipping back multiple times. And alright - that just leaves. Uh. Me. Uh oh! Time to abandon Spook. Kami teases, boot on edge so she can lean down at me from above. A stunning recovery, if ever there was one. I know where yall keep ya shit, so dont try me! I growl, tail low and swiping. Forced to stare up at the eagerly gesturing hands above. "God, damnit, I hate peer pressure...." I heave a breath, ears pricking as the monsters within start to hiss and scrabble and squirm and boil and..... No. It''s just my imagination. The deep, dead, dark is full of clangs and rattles and thumping droplets. "Spook." Kami says, over comms. "We brought the roll-up ladder. But you make me use it, and I''m gonna make it a big bloody production. You get me?" "Right..... Right." I heave. "It''s just three floors. I can jump it. I can grapple." But my mind latches on to the welling darkness of the abyss above, which grins. Oh yes. Little thing. Jump. Let me coil about your arms and legs. And..... "No. No. No. I do not like heights! And do not want to go up a stupid bloody wobbly ladder made of string......!" "Spook." Kami presses. "Monsters." "I know! I know! But-" Okay. Gotta focus. Down phobia! Down! I can do this! That didn''t help. The others look annoyed. Zip clicks his piercing. "Could we, like, bolt the ladder to that pillar?" Believe in Spook. Kami says, more out of hope than anything. Demon still reaching a spiky hand down to me. Smiling. Gesturing. And, God, how I want to. Maybe him or Tufty came back down- I jerk and wince as the wimpy cat bounces along the edge of the upper balcony, like it''s nothing. Sniffing at this and that. Poking things with his claws. Kid yanks at this stumpy metal clamp-thing that once held the missing glass - and does a tiny, happy, little hop. Spook! Ummmm? Hi.....? He fumbles his breather. Umm...." He glances at Kami. "H-How about this thing?? We could weld the ladder to it? Or? Or? Damnit! I hate how much they''re trying to help. I aim my grapple at the hungry dark above, and.... No..... Nononono...... Awesome! Weld it on, and lets go! I beam, like its kitty who needs the ladder. Not because I even want to use it, but because it buys me time to not be climbing. Zip flips me a thumbs up, and activates the tiny mouse-bot army in Tuftys backpack. Sending them scooting out over his hands (Eee! Hey! Heheh! That tickles!) "Zipper!" I snap. "Use your bloody stick-welder! He''ll bloody fall-!" "Mate! Hey! Chil!" "Temporary Comrade Commander!" The mouse-leader salutes Zip. "These struts are made from inferior capitalist metal! Not an honest lick of cardboard in any of it!" "Just weld it, mate." Zip chuckles as the loose strut is inspected by tiny, contemptuous, robot eyeballs. "Ridiculous! Standards are slipping, I tell you!" "Last chance!" Kami warns me. "Absolute circus production! Clowns and bloody everything!" "I know!" I growl as the bots eat away the rust and dirt to expose pure gleaming metal. And Kami strings the loop of the ladder round the metal strut, like a noose. Dimly, the notion of welding pegs me in the back of my horribly abused brain. As if something about this might be a terribly bad idea, though I cant quite pin down wh- The mice touch sparking tails to the metal, and a wall of blank white nothingness that punches me right in the face. Scouring away all sight and sensation with pure, and unimaginably bright, light. Like someone dropped a flashbang, without the bang. It hammers upward in a blinding beacon - splashing off dirty concrete and rusted metal. Routing shadows from their hideyholes, and setting them to roar and dance and flicker across like jumping wells of oil. Ten seconds of blazing, flashing, flickering fire. And then the dark swarms back. Our bionic eyes glitching to cope. And silence. All of us holding our breath. Tink. Clink. CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!!! "SHIT!" I scream. "Just rope up, you idiot!!!" Kami howls. But it''s too late. Too late. Out of the thundering depths, rises a sound to wipe away every clank of rain and metal above. Not a roar, or a screech, or a haunting cry, but a sound no living or unliving thing has ever made. A sound so unreal, and unholy, and impossibly wild it grabs every hair on my body and yanks it upward. A thousand screaming gasps through a thousand holes could not have made that. Nothing could have. But the thing in there. A greasy wing rips the metal sheets aside, and my back slams fully into the door. All guns forgotten. All escape denied. Every thought in my head reduced to a single, childish, pathetic little noise. The kind I''ve heard from so many kids, right before they died. "Oh." And then the wall comes apart, like Hell itself is rising. > > >< < < >> Welcome To The QIZ >> Welcome To The QIZ Howling things rise from the deeps to slams against my tinfoil walls as the monster, or monsters, flail and crash about inside the slum-house. Breaking the roof, and shattering walls. Sending struts tumbling down, and down and down. Iron claws ripping through rusted metal, cracking old paint and tearing dead wires. My whole team screaming and shouting and hammering in my ear as something HUGE breaches the wide gap between the balcony and the ceiling in a wave of thrashing wings and claws. Wings upon wings upon wings bending and ripping their way through the screaming metal shield around my concrete tomb. Reaching out in whirling streams that splat against the ground and walls. Feeling. Groping. Red eyes in the black. Hungry. Hunting. As it rips literal sheet-metal in half. There are no hands or legs or bodies - only more, and more of those oily-wet wings. Hundreds more. With saw-toothed claws along all the edges - reaching and grasping and snapping. It draws in air, with a puff of rage, and expels it through a billion little holes in its skin - conjuring the wail of a vast demonic orchestra. A howl that bites you, deep as bone, and carves the very soul from your body. But even as my mind goes blank, and my fear transfers to this wretched harmonium of Hell, my hands jerk on reflex. Ripping my SMG up into the firing position. Rocket rounds blowing fat holes in the tin wall as I pump out five, solid, quad-shots in a row. Ignoring the screams from above. The grapples fired at my armour - missing as I dodge the beast.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 200/220 Spare Mags :: 4/4
Sparks roar from my weapon, but the damn thing is right in my face. Flailing huge, glistening, wings. Roaring its tsunami of hate, as it presses me back toward the door - and the other monster. I hit it again, but too fast. The SMG''s capacitors whining, begging, pleading, as they fight to charge the railgun boosters of my rocket-powered gun. My finger snapping the trigger faster than it can build. Alternating weak ''pops'' of flame, and huge railgun roars of sparks. Too fast. Way too fast. I''m risking a jam worse than the Wayman battle. But I can''t stop. Not even to blink, as the monster jerks and stutters toward me. Never recoiling, even as I blast out rocket-railgun flames like dragon-breath. Drilling gyrojet bullets through wings and flesh. But it''s almost out. It''s almost on me. And the next shot weak, and unboosted. Bouncing off. Too slow to penetrate - not at close range. It won''t be enough. "Shit, mate! Like, we can''t see you! We can''t shoot it!" "Demon can''t jump down!" Kami screams, after. "It''ll bloody tear him apart! It''s a bloody meat-grinder!" "I know!" I scream. "I know!" "Shit! He''s going to try anyway!" She shouts. "Don''t you bloody dare! I need a precision shot! Precision!" I roll again, and spray bullets wide - exploding the few little stalk-eyes. But it just doesn''t care. Like they''re parasites, or tagalongs. And Zipper can''t shoot either. He has the other SMG, and it''s a smooth-bore fire-support weapon meant for raiding and lone operatives. The four barrels designed to kick bullets off in random directions. Even worse: we brought zero combat capable drones. Zero. Meaning Zipper is dead-out as fire-support. Meaning my only hope is Kami, and her big bad gun. But it needs setup. Assembly. A clear shot. And in the wild, flailing, mess down here we ain''t giving her any of that. It''s all my fault..... Another grapple zings down, boring a hole through the monster. I scream. Not just at the flailing thing that''s suddenly in my face, but the idea I might be suddenly hauled up into the air - then fall. Which is more than likely, if they hit. The very thought stuttering my fire. Making me flinch. "Stop that! Stop it! I can''t!" "Spook! Stop being an idiot! It''s going to bloody eat you!" "No-" But they''re right. It''s no good. I can''t kill it. Not here. Not this close. It''s filling the narrow space. Tearing deep gashes in my armour. My gun. My hands. My everything. The wings are freaking everywhere. If it actually gets in here, it''ll wrap me up and buzzsaw me clear in half. Which means I gotta kill it, or get out. But I can''t grapple up. Can''t jump. Can''t even climb past the damn thing. And that''s not just the fear talking, either - everything above me is a shredding carnage of wings. Its talons dug deep into every crack. Best option? Might be to bolt through the door. Hit all fours. Flee to the lift. But I gotta keep that in reserve. It''s a massive bloody risk in itself. We secured the other monster - we assume. But it wouldn''t even be the fifteenth time that didn''t work. And I don''t like my odds if it made it through that door. Or some hole in the wall. Or whatever else crazy thing it might do. But this is devolving fast, and I need a plan. But as I dodge again, the flailing ''wings'' slam into me. Knocking me flying across the tiny concrete box. Lidless eyeballs pouring in on fleshy stalks glaring, blindly, at everything around me. Searching for something it can''t seem to see..... My own narrow. Does it hunt by sound? Is it blind? Either way, it''s time to get nasty. Mentally, I trigger my suit''s flashbangs. Hitting the option to drop all four, right off my body. Or try to. Everything locks, for a split second, and my vision goes blinding red with errors. Connection failure. Power surge. My implant heating red-hot in my skull. I tumble toward the door, in one last-ditch rush. Firing wildly and slashing out with claws as I roll beneath the morass. This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings. But the wings are armour, and arms, and teeth, and stomping legs all in one. They rip at my helmet. They slam against my back. And that''s it. That''s the straw. I need to get out that door, any way I can - but I can''t even see the bloody thing now. Or the walls. Or anything except the viciously serrated wings expanding to fill the whole damned space. Dragging around and around in that cloud of jagged, flailing, flapping, limbs. Forcing me to find the hooks in my armour, and smash them with my pistol-butt. Rolling out of of its lethal embrace. Directly towards the exit- Except it isn''t. It''s the balcony. I''ve been turned around.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 168/220
Shit, this is not sustainable. It''s bleeding, crashing into walls, attacked from all sides. I may as well be in its belly already. And I''m no nearer to finding a weakness, soft spot, or big glowing shoot-me target. I gotta weaken it. Scare it off. Something. Anything. "Flashbangs!" I scream. "Do it!" "Spook, they''ll hit you-" "Flipping to heat-vision! Do it!" I try, but the errors spike again - even as flashbangs rain in a roar of light, and noise, and chaos. Turning everything to shadow, and light, and flailing. And falling. And bashing into walls. Sobbing as my sensitive ears are eviscerated - my implant stuttering as combat-filters fail to filter out the noise. I can''t even shut it off, because then I''ll be blind and deaf once more. So I shut my eyes, and scream as I stumble and panic and tumble toward the door. Tiny bulbs roaring white fury around me as the creature goes utterly berserk. But, not in the way I thought. The wing-monster, whatever it is, leaps on the freaking flashers like they''re food and plucks them up with Hellish precision. Literally gobbling them down. If I had time, or the ability to even process it, I''d stop to freaking stare. But I''ve got to go. I''ve got to. So I rush the door, like I''m stuck on a rubber rope, getting grabbed and slashed from every direction. Gaining deep lashes in my hands and the plates of my suit. Kami must have seen me, because she fires down on it. The BOOM of thunder rocking my skull as a massive projectile slams past, spewing fire and oily black blood. But the thing doesnt have a freaking body to hit. Its all flapping. All grabbing. All screeching and madness and it''s almost all the way in here. So I clear a way - bullets bouncing off wall and floor and metal door. No sparks - just SMACKS and KRANGS of heavy impact. Trails of fire. And shiny new dents. "MATE! We gotta drop Demon!" No! It''s nearly out! It''ll rend ya in two if ya land on it! I yell as the thing grabs my leg and slams me away from the door. Sharp things raking through my tail, as I slip away. Failing to purchase. But pain bites my knee, my foot, my neck as the front of my helmet meets ground. I slash with claws, but the pain lashes them. It''s like sticking my arm in spikes. But I twist away. I launch up. Blood streaming from flesh and armour alike as I finally manage to wrench open the door, tumbling back into the hallway. Banging off walls. Tripping on air. Stumbling. Cursing. For a second it roils in confusion. Like it doesn''t know where I went. But the second I think I''m safe, the freakish monster pours itself in through the door. Ripping free of the metal sheets, and inhaling massively. Gripping the ceiling, the empty doorways, the walls, all at once. Flickers and flashes of dark light seeping from its whirling mass, like distant shots of thunder. "I''m safe! I''m safe! Kill it!!" I scream, and fire again as I run. And my team unleash an absolute storm of fire upon it. Zipper''s floating ammo-count plunging from 440 to zero in a matter of seconds. A maelstrom of flashing rockets that shred the creature a thousand tiny new holes. Full-auto, quad-barrelled, SMG. 22 calibre. Two entire mags at once. It isn''t enough. And the instant I realise this is the same, exact, one that the creature decides it''s had enough of that. Compacting itself fully inside the hall, and bowling after me like a billing fingers of reaching death. Still barely, freaking, bleeding. As if it''s made of thread and sticks, and all we''re hitting is air. Even worse, I''m not alone. My head snaps around on impulse, and I skitter to a sudden stop. Right ahead of me, a mass of long, greenish-purple, blade-arms are prying their Goddamned way round that red-crossed security door. Not hands. Not paws. Gigantic, bow-like, mantis claws - quick as greased death, and lined with sticky-looking spikes. Hideous poisons staining the door as it fights to rend it open, or twist it clear off its rails. It''s struggling. Snarling. But oddly focused, like it''s actually intelligent. I know I won''t get by unharmed. Not like this. So I hit the alt-fire [Burst] mode on my SMG, and utterly hose the thing with bullets. From this far back, with actual boost and an actual target, I wreck havoc. Exploding one of the reaching mantis-arms, and sending it into a frenzy. The thing starts fighting the door itself, and I leap to hit the opposite wall. Bouncing off it, quick as I can.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 144/220
Even so, the screeching nightmare insect is pissed, and it almost gets me. I can feel it breaking free. All it needs is to smash whatever bolt or mechanism the door has, and the resistance will banish. Then there''ll be two freakish, unknowable, nightmare things after me - and I ain''t betting my life on them not being friends. Not when the screaming wing-creature is a rolling wave of death crashing down the hallway behind me. Stabbing its claws into walls and ceiling and floor. Devouring the adverts as it rolls directly over them. Killing their happy people. Clawing their faces. Gouging their eyes. Devouring the bulbs, and the lights, and everything within. Leaving only dark and dribbling chemicals. "Light!" I yell at my team. "It''s the freakin'' light! It wants it!" "Flashbangs out!" Kami screams, and suddenly the monster has a dozen tiny targets. Each and every one vomiting and endless, strobing, VIOLENCE of light and withering noise. Sending the hammering wings and screaming shapes into an absolute chaos beyond anything I''ve ever seen. To say it goes mad would be to put it bloody lightly. It demolishes the hallway. Blasting it wide open, into the flats above and either side. Ripping up the floor, like some crazed explosion of living flesh. If they''d put a freaking bomb in there, it wouldn''t have come close. I might not be getting out of here, holy shit. Darkness. I could hide in the dark... an apartment..... but what if it has other senses? The lift? Shit, no. It''ll chase me up the shaft..... No. This has to end. Now. Without us wasting any more of our precious, precious ammo. Grenade selection lights up my implant with errors, but somehow I trigger the auto-throw and my off-hand whips out of my control. I focus on aim as it dives under my cloak and rags - yanking a ball free, and hurling it at the mantis in one smooth motion. The ball bounces off one wall, right as my off-hand snaps back onto the gun. I dive into the nearest flat, and stick my gun-camera out the door. Waiting. Waiting. Right until the massive, boiling, monster passes that critical point- I hit the detonator, and my HUD goes dead. My vision blacks. All sound shut off as my implant dies.. No. No, no, no, no...... Restart. Restart. It fires back up, into Safe Mode - right as the wing monster slams into the mantis. Screeching that siren song of utter mayhem as it rips, and saws, and feasts on tiny snacks of flesh. Like it was trying to do to me. The mantis recoiling, and screaming back. Slashing at the thing. Trying to eat it as well. I trigger the grenade again, and my system almost blacks. But I hit it again. I hit- The explosion tears through both monsters, and rips the carpet to confetti. Pulsing a massive shockwave, ridden by half a pound of cube-shaped shrapnel. Mangling the mantis. Pumping it with holes. Scouring the walls, and killing every light the monsters couldn''t manage. All of which is very, very, very bad news for a nebulous monster made of freakish black wings. Especially since the blast literally it originated from literally inside it. As in, I think it ate the damn thing. The result is absolutely freaking spectacular. Literal monster salsa. Silence falls. Ringing, and bright, and filled with nothing but my own breath. And a mad little laugh as I turn myself around, and slam my back into the wall. Sliding all the way down it. "Guess..... who.... freakin''..... won..... bitches......" I wheeze as the shouting on coms becomes an absolute storm. The whole world ringing with it as my comms stutter in and out. My implant stuttering, quietly, as I stare up at nothing and darkness. Bleeding, very gently on the floor. "Guess who won....." >>><<< >> Dreams Of Rust >> Dreams of Rust Something small, green, and moist impacts my face at blurring speed. "Spook! Spook! Spook! Are you okay!??" Tufty wails as tears stream down the one, visible, side of his face. Huge, feline, eye blinking, furiously - until I yelp and shove him off. Panting hard. "Hey! No!" "Ah! B-But you''re hurt! You''re hurt!" He hops back upright, bounding over the dusty carpet on all fours. "You''re all... all b-bloody! Do you wanna go home?? Should-" I raise a hand to bomp him down, but clench and pull away. "I''m, fine ya lil idiot! Just gimmie a sec-" I rip open my medical satchel and frown, eyes snapping up at the cat. "Huh. Have ya gotten heavier?" He blinks at me. Furiously. "Nevermind." "MATE! MATE!" Zipper yells, slamming into the doorframe and tumbling into the room. Caked in goopy monster bits, head to toes. "Like, damn! That was crazy! And-" Demon twists him aside, and drops to glare at me. Gremlin superglued to his shoulder, like a tight scaly loaf with huge blinking eyes. "Zpook, you-" "I''m fine!" I repeat, as Kami stumbles in after. Trailing a series of grossed-out noises and glaring at her boots. "YOU! THERE YOU ARE, YOU BLOODY IDIOT!" She makes like she''s gonna slap me. But then drops her arm, and yanks something outta the shoulder-joint of my armour. The pain there dropping considerably as the plates rearrange. Providing pressure, and closing the wound. "Grrraah! How many times have I told you that phobia is gonna get us all killed?" "Once or twice." I mutter, ears limp and sheepish. Demon and Tufty sniffing my cuts as she unpacks the swabs from my kit. Ripping them from my hands. "If you''d just come up when we asked. Just fired grapples, or..... whatever. It would have taken a second to get up there. And we''d have never even met that damn thing. Or it would have busted out way behind you, and we''d have torn it to bits." "I know." My ears droop lower. Though it''s hard not to chuckle with the relief, and the adrenaline, and Tufty making wibbly faces at me. "Good. Now, get that armour off. I''m going to patch this up." I shy back, into the wall. "Hold up! Im the bloody medic!" Zip frowns. "Aren''t you, like, some weird fancy Leader Prestige Class or somethin''?" "An [Argent]." I flick a wry smirk. "[Argent Subcommander]."
LMG Operative - Argent Subcommander Battlegroup Leader Specialties: [Leader - Airforce], [Pilot], [Field Medic], [Striker], [Infiltrator], [Classified], [Classified] Rank: [Classified] Role: [Classified] Other Information: [Classified]
"Mate." Zip winces. "Y''know.... that''s kinda not a reassuring thing to show people?" "Right! But, see?" I insist. "Says right here. I''m a bloody medic!" "In theory." Kami allows with all the grace of someone forced, at gunpoint, to dunk their head in cold baked beans. "In practice, our real medic is dead. And you''re a bloody jittering mess, hyped up and ready to kill a guy." A metal finger jabs my nose. "You can''t reach round your back. And it''s bloody hard to treat yourself one-handed." Eh. Ill be alright! I shiver, coming down off the adrenalin. Just gotta walk it off. Lacerations. Puncture wounds. Monster Species: Unknown. Her hand-scanner interjects, flooding my skin with its weird light. Possibility of infection or poison. Please seek medical attention. "Spook." She smiles, sweetly. Raising an eyebrow at me. "You can be afraid me treating your wounds gently, and carefully, or-" her metal fist slams out to impact the wall by my face. Denting the plaster. "-you can just be afraid. Very, very, afraid." The grin gets wider. "Because, either way, this is happening. I won''t let your phobias get to get us killed." My eyes flick to Demon, beside me. His entire body, suddenly, very still. Staring at my knee as he shivers, for a second, then walks out. I blink at that - then up at Zip, who winces and raises hands. Backing off, and turning to follow. The two of them moving out to secure the flat, and make a perimeter. But, the truth is, this makes it easier. Because it''s the caring touch I''m afraid of. The touch that Tufty threw at me. Not the cold, clinical, swab of a metal hand. "Okaaay....." I wheeze. "Fiinne." "Good." She sniffs, as she hustles me into the ruined bathroom. And we both pretend the violence wasn''t a show. A cheatcode. A ruse to avoid my terror of intimacy. We clear it, quickly, and I kneel down. Letting her pull the rest of the spikes from the joints in my armour, while Tufty melts into a sad puddle of weeb in the corner. Kami grumpily, but quickly, swabs out the little holes in my hands. Pinning them back together with plastic strips that dig prickly nano-wire hooks into my skin. Shrinking together to seal the wounds shut. Then she straps them with long, hard-wearing, waterproof bandaids designed for GMOs. Sealing in all that fresh, woundy, goodness. Then we get my armour off, and strip my underlay down off my back. Kami wincing in the dusty old mirror. "Shit. Looks like you slept on nails...." She stares at the mass of superficial scratches covering my armour, and then at the pockmarks. "It was looking for the gaps. Found them. Wormed its way in." "That.... is bloody scary." "And it went after blinding light....." She shakes her head. "What kind of bloody thing would it hunt?" "Dunno. Giant glowing turtle-fungus?" I hesitate. "Pirate junkers." "It was a bioweapon?" Her hands stutter. "Shit, Spook. Are we sure we should be doing this? Maybe we could hit something easier. Like a gang." "I do owe Wayman a good bloody kickin''." I growl, claws flexing with animal intent. "But no. Not yet. We gotta do this. We need it." Her hands stop. "We could still take The Night Tyrant." "Can''t." I shiver. "Not unless we wanna risk it, landing on that bridge." "Bloody tempting, mate." Zip calls over comms. "If you like Suicide Spiders." "Nobody likes Suicide Spiders." I growl. "Least of all, the bloody Suicide Spiders." She frowns. "Remind me. What do they do again?" "Y''don''t wanna know, mate." Zip chuckles. "Nothin'' that makes me feel safe parkin'' my baby down there." I grumble as her pale dreads flick my face. "Best case scenario? We get back and it''s covered in drippy poetry." Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original. "Best, best, case. Mate." Zip snorts. Kami finishes my back, and she moves to my legs. Then my foot, which is too leather-tough to be much of a graze. Then she looks me over. "Alright. I''ve seen worse. You''ll do." "Gee. Thanks." I twist against the prickly, stiff, bindings. But I suit myself, anyway. Snapping a spare mag onto the one in my gun to top it off, as Tufty bops about nervously. "What? You need the loo?"
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 356/440
"Um. Um, I hear..... hear things in the walls...." He whispers, ears trembling and flat. "I...." I swallow. "Shit. I thought I was imaginin'' that...." I trade eyes with Kami. "Yeah. Screw this place." I swallow. "C''mon. I got monsters to explode...." We traipse out of the ruined flat, and make a wide detour around the gooy and glorious horror-show in the hallway. Jumping through blasted-open walls, and crossing blasted-through bathrooms. Trailed by a sheepish, and very filthy, Zipper. Who may or may not be the cause of the vaguely Zipper-shaped splat right in the middle of the monster. We slip back out the door with overt caution. Eyeing the blasted-inward barricade, and the collapse behind it. Silence, and distant rain, shimmering against my ears. Gremlin making soft noises from under Demon''s cloak. "Ready to do this?" Kami remarks. Casually. "Rrggh." "Think of it like this." She smiles. "Can''t be worse than the monster." I stare at her. "Yeah. Yeah it can." I shudder. "But.... I''m gonna do it." And, it ain''t easy. It ain''t quick. It ain''t dignified. But I do. I tumble over the parapet, and sprawl on a patchwork metal hallway. Cool rust dribbling between my fingers and crackling between toes. I let myself have a little moment, admiring how horribly the whole thing creaks. My crew working quickly to clutter our new hidden entrance with camouflage. The mingled odours of oil, and iron, and age pouring in around us as I push myself up. "Yeah!! Well done, mate!" Zip cheers, itching to slap my back. Demon, off to one side, giving me the ole stiff-nod-and grunt-of-respect as Tufty peeps round his tail. Leaving me feel abashed, and heated. At least until Kami nudges in, and I tip it all on her with a lil smirk. "Y''gonna give me a lollypop, ain''t ya?" "What." She jerks. "For climbin'' that thing all on my own?" I grin. "No. Definitely not." She stutters. "This is not a thing that''s happening. It would be very childish." "I can totally smell it, y''know. Gimmie." "Rrrghh." She slaps it into my chest, and I grin. Red Flavour. I love it. I rattle it around in my mouth as we creep along the narrow walkway. Taking in the mess of shanty houses welded to the sides and stacked above us, twenty tall. Once, it might have been cared for and loved - or as fetid a place as you could hope for. But any trace of that is an aeon rotted and gone. Washed away, to oblivion, by soft rain and passage of time. Now? It''s almost a wonderland of decay. The kind of place you really want to poke about in - but really, really shouldn''t. Preserved more by its mangled layers than any kind of design. Though, I realise, someone clearly had a plan here - once. The layers ordered, and measured, with gantries and supports. But chaos must have come, before the end. The newer buildings a mangled mockery of angles and edges - welded together from mismatched parts. The sky above laced, and layered, with endless cables that rattle and shift in the wind. Wire taps on wire taps. Internet stolen from boxes stealing internet. We creep on between gaunt poles. Bent windows. Jutting walls. With bitty rust beneath reddening toes, all knobbly with rusted-in bars and random bolts. Our breath low, and quiet, as the cables clatter in the wind. Tufty jerking and jumping at shadows. Clutching our tails as we pass darkened holes. Twisted ladder-ways. Fallen doors. Fallen gantries. Fallen worlds. Scanning the above with eyes that shift with subtle static. With jerking lines, almost too faint to see. Colours inverting, and shifting, in subtle little ways. Phantom sounds cracking my mind as shoddy chips malfunction. Churning my tail with quiet, restless, energy. Whatever happens next, we can''t stop. We gotta come back with money. A lot of it. And we gotta come back tonight. Before my implant fails. Before the world shrinks to smell and touch. And darkness. Before Wayman, The School, the things in the dark, catch us all undefended. Out of ammo. Out of chances. Disabled, and blind. Claws bite bandaids as my fingers curl. But I force myself to quieten my mind, and listen the static in the rain above. Beating on layers upon layers of metal, like a great iron drum. Zipper''s mouse-bots flickering through the ruins, under full mental control. Scouting routes. Flagging monsters. Cutting any power thats left. And tagging fat bounties of copper-cable to strip and harvest later. "Polybius, you still got us?" I say, tapping the side of my helmet as two stubby aerials unfold from the top. Waggling like little antenna. "Polybius?" Nothing. Too much metal blocking the signal. Uplinks dead on the walls around us. Entrance is near. I think. Zip says it''s hidden. Kami reports, as Zipper sprays a ''gang-tag'' on the corner to mark our way home. Gremlin peering down at it, curiously, from the wall above. Itching to pat at the paint with lil paws. Knowing him, it''s some a faction logo from a game too old to remember. "Just hang a right, mate." He says, and we peer down a narrow avenue. Its little, lost, houses strangely homely. "Gosh, I hope we don''t have to come back." Tufty breathes. Quietly shivering fallen droplets from his lurid green ears. Gremlin tilting her shining red eyes as she reaches out a mischievous paw to snag one. Missing, only, because Demon steps hurriedly back. Whaat?? Ah! C''mon, lil mate!" Zip knocks him, practically bouncing in excitement.. "Secret passages! Treasure! Old stuff! Delving into mysteries, and stuff! Like, it''s got ''cool fun adventure'' written all over it! "Um..... I don''t think so." Tufty wibbles, hugging Gremlin tight to his chest. (A risky manoeuvre, if ever there was one.) Eh. C''mon ya nerds. I snort. Testing the path with my toes before applying full weight. "Seems safe enou-" The whole structure groans like some vast, demented, leviathan. Shivers rattling up my spine from tail-tip to nose. Zipper grins, slapping the iron wall. "Don''t worry bout it mate. Like, it''s all deck plates ripped from old ships. Like, totally hard as rock. And-" "Zip." I say, very calmly. "Shhhh." "Right, mate. On it, mate." We creep deeper into the winding maze of mangled doorways tumbling down, and down. Into looted shacks, caved and broken. We go slow and careful as we reach the exit. Scanning. Poking things with extendible poles. Hiding the last, dwindling, few of our tiny cameras in whatever rusty holes we can. Right up until we find the tripwire. It''s old. Broken. Trailing in through a door to meet the good ole shotgun-on-a-string aimed right at the window. Useless, now. Rusted in place. But we deal with it quickly, and leave with even more caution. Soon after, I feel a light shift beneath the pad of my foot - and leap back. "Pressure plate?" I murmur. "No..... It felt wrong. More like a sea-saw...." We let Kami scan it - no explosives, no wires. So I reach out, again, with my toes and push sloowly down until my weight shifts the floor. Trapdoor." We all say, at once, and I shiver deeply as the maw grinds opens. Revealing some nasty-ass rusty spikes - decorated by the mandatory skeleton. "Shit. Weld it?" Kami hisses. Sending a shudder through the whole group. Images of the monster.... "Nah mate. It''s all defence, right?" Zip grins with mischief. "Put, like, a safety on it. Use it." "Either way, leave it for now." I nudge my head, and we mark it off with the standard trap symbol. Jagged lines across a box. Tufty shivers and skitters on all fours as we slip away through houses. His small heart hammering, so loud. His eyes increasingly on edge. Sensitive hearing plus sensitive kid equalling tiny hisses of "Eep! Did you hear that!?! every few minutes. Plus plenty of spinning about and clinging to tails. "Remember what I said." I mutter, extracting mine. And he shivers a little. "I''m sorry...." He whispers, tugging his own. "I''m.... just......" Not brave. My hand twitches again, but I shake it off. "Buck up. We need ya to keep eyes out." I look over to Kami and Zip, as they peel open a narrow hole in the outer walls of the slumTower. Revealing the struts of a skyBridge built back when The City was young. A road tented in gleaming superGlass panels that once gleamed in the light of an artificial sun.... ....at least, if the oldest myths are true. A swarm of Zipper''s bees slip through the secret hatch, soon followed by us. The vast bridge spanning scraper to scraper, to stand beneath great sheets of crystal that no dirt can ever stick to. Tall and proud as sails on a grand, and endless, ship that curves from tower to tower. Splitting and re-joining. Its dark tar-like surface dimly lit by a procession of ancient everLights, so old and worn they barely give flickering shape to the murk of this great bridge. And the devastation that looms from every angle upon it. Crumpled hoverCars, etched out in shadows of blue and green and red. Mangled jetBikes of no make I''ve ever seen. The spokes of their wheels ripped apart, and.... melted together by darkness and decay. As if the very metal were alive, or tried to be. Melding with broken lorries and torn-up vans, on impact. Or maybe not. I step onto the gritty, papery, surface of the forgotten skyBridge - and shiver. The others creeping in behind, with weapons ready. Ready for anything. And, slowly, I lean forward. Reaching down to nudge the endless carpet of distorted bones. Mangled, twisted, and mutilated into a vast mayhem of shapes. Built into heaping, fallen, things too Wrong to have ever lived. So wrong you can''t possibly look away. All glimmering dim colours, in the neon filtering down from Karrak - high above. Shifting beneath the vast, red, holographic banners that loom vast above the road. Streaming with yellow and black hazard tape.
? WARNING! ? QUEBEC ISOLATION ZONE AHEAD! CONTAINMENT LEVEL: MAXIMUM ALL LIVES FORFEIT UPON ENTRY
"Welcome." I whisper. "To Ground Zero." The heart of a dead nation. >>><<< >> Bridge To A Fallen Land >> Bridge To A Fallen Land Our guns track across the skulls and fingers of the long, long, dead. The entire skyBridge a river of mangled, skeletal, nightmares curving from horizon to horizon. Every socket bleeding soft, dark, soil that pools around the wrecks and fallen forms. Strange, glowing, fungi and unknowable vines threaded noses and eyes and holes I cannot name. Wrapping those monstrous things in festive curls of chalky colour. As if it had devoured them. Alive. And strung them back together, like puppets. Zipper swallows, quietly, and tips a skull with cupping toes. Revealing the huge, ragged, exit-wound burst out through the back. The jaw tumbling wide and wild in an endless, empty, scream. "Oh Hell." I whisper. "That one''s human." You noticing a theme here? Kami mutters. Inclining her head at the eerie, frozen, scene. "Y''mean all the bullet holes?" I murmur. "Or the way it ain''t ever been looted? Ever?" "Vines. Kah." Demon growls, ominously. "Bindings." "Uh, yeah, so, like..... is it me....." Zip stutters. "....or were they, like, all running this way?" "Yep." I murmur, grimly. "C''mon." I hop a couple of steps, over skulls and scattered teeth, then look back. The others still poised, exactly where I left them. Guns ready. Eyes wide, and sharp. Zip and Kami sharing a look. Hers becomes a glare, and she nudges him. He nudges back, and she scowls harder. Then they both stare at Tufty, who blinks mutely. "What?" I raise an eyebrow. "Ten Blood says something''s gonna try to eat us." Kami says, smugly. I shake my head. "And you?" "Well, like, I got five on who it eats first-" He grins. "You lot are a right bloody riot." I grumble, hopping through the hole. Onto the prickly, high-traction, grit of the skyWay road. "Y''coming?" "Fifty Blood says it''s Spook." Kami not-exactly-whispers. But when I flick a look they all start to follow. First, the scratch of Demon''s claws. Then Kami''s boots, clattering clumsily through fallen bones. Until, at last..... "Meww..... I wanna go home." Tufty mumbles. A shiver in his breath. A shake. But then he skitters in bounds, until he''s right by my ankles. Primed, on all fours, and ready to bolt. But here. With us. And, I guess, that''s all I can ask for. "Freaking creepy as crap, mate." Zip whispers, nudging up on my other side. His gun fixed on a thing with five, massive, legs bound up in glowing ivy. "Like, what even happened here?" "I got Polybius n'' Theo diggin'' into it." I murmur back as Kami joins us on the other side. Holding up a pair of leg-bones twisted and fused together. "What kind of monster even is this?" She breathes. "Scans just say bone. No info." "I''d be more worried about that ivy stuff, mate." Zip says, in a low voice. "That stuff is everywhere." "Should we scan it?" Kami shivers, clearly not wanting to. And we all stare up at the nearest mound of nightmare-fuel. Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator. "Hell no." I hiss. "Don''t go near it. This ain''t the time to play CSI: Shithole." "Yah, mate. Or touch it." Zip edges in. Tufty shivering horribly beside us as Demon''s eyes twitch at shapes in the dark. "But like.... Like...." He almost chokes. "is it me, or...." He points back the way we came. And I frown. "What?" "It''s moving. Mate." He says very, very, quietly. Sending tiny thrills twisting up my back. "....what is?" I breathe, reverting to throat-mic. "How can you tell? It''s behind yo-" Zipper''s bees lift off his shoulders, darting fretfully. "Mate. I can see it." "Do we run?" Kami winces, eyes twitching across the uneven scree of bone. "Can we?" "I still ain''t sure what''s movin''." I growl, though I''ve got a horrible idea. "Forward or back?" Kami hisses. "Mate. You, like, you don''t g-get it...." Zipper''s breaths quicken as his wild blue eyes dart to ours. "....there''s no ''back''." "Oh." Kami says, quite calmly. "Shit." "No sudden bloody moves." I lift, slightly, onto my toes. "Keep walkin''." We quicken, a little, eyes on the looming tower ahead. Tufty huddled right into Demon''s knee, tail a brush. Gremlin stuck to his back with all her claws - hackles up, eyes wild, as we edge along the bridge. Stepping over the dead, and the ruins of their lives. Death dont phase me - not anymore. But all the stories written in it? Those get me. See that? A dad covering his family. Over there? Last stand. Round behind that jetBike? Didnt see it coming. Over here - big kids protecting littler kids. Twisted in mutant ivy. And you can see how they fell - two bigger ones knocked down. Flailing. Ripped apart. Then, behind them.... I see Badger. Tufty. Gremlin. I look away. And all the time, Zipper gets paler and paler. His eyes wilder. Silver threads rising from his hair. "Offramp ahead." I hiss. It''s right up inside the vast, dead, megaTower ahead. Two hundred metrics, at most, to the tower. A hundred more to the ramp. But the clutter is thickening. The vines fat and well-fed. Pulsing with dots of bright colour that speed through veins and leaves like blood. A slow creak, a rustling, right at the edge of hearing. As if something slow, and steady, and relentless, and huge were shifting into place. Too careful to be seen. "Mate." Zip swallows. "It''s closing us off-" "RUN!" I yell, and all of as slam forward into a stumbling - leaping - run through the field of bones. Huge sail-like panes of glass flashing by above us. A dead military checkpoint ahead, its rusted guns still ready. We put on pace. Kami cursing and stumbling behind us, too slow. The GMOs on all fours and blurring for the off-ramp. Two hundred metrics. Kami''s boot twists on a scree of skulls, and she screams. The whole mass of ivy shaking, suddenly, as if shocked by a blast of wind. Demon slams back to her. Grabs a metal arm. She curses his name, and tries to shove him off. But he grabs her again, and they hurtle back toward us. The rustle turning to a groan, and then a shriek. Metal on metal. We cross the checkpoint by leaping the hell over it. Fronds of ivy catching at our ankles, without ever seeming to move. But we bowl onward. Demon full-on carrying Kami as we blow through the cathedral-high arch in the side of the megaTower. Entire trucks and colossal bone-heaps groaning and shifting around us. A stolen glance backward, and I almost fall as well. The skulls. The monstrous, hulking, forms..... They''re looking at us. "FORGET THE RAMP!" I scream. "SERVICE DOOR! GO! GO!" I slam a breaching charge to the handle, and we jerk out of the way. The blast a THUMP of pressure in my insides. Felt, but hardly heard. The door itself rocked open by the force. The whole pack of us diving into the stairway. Zip on all fours, which he almost never does. Everybody else grabbing the door. Hauling it shut. Our drone-tek and [Sniper] welding the thing, solid, to its frame in seconds. Only then do we collapse. "I.... really.... really.... really.... miss.... my.... PAW." I pant, breath slowing almost immediately. Along with our panic. "Mate." Zipper sighs. "Like, can I have drones with flamethrowers-" "YES!" Everyone yells, as one. "Just don''t let Badger near em." I snort, as something bangs on the door. All of us going very quiet. "Uh......" Zipper says, cautiously. "Y''know how that door has, like, a hole in it now?" "Yeah. Right. Lets go. I growl. C''mon....." We hustle up, and move. Kami limping, and last. Which is why she sees it, and lets out a single soft gasp. "Spook." I turn at the edge of the lightless stairway. The welded door still smoking, gently, as that strange light pours in. Casting ragged shapes, and shadows, across the bare concrete. "Oh, Hell....." I say, very quietly, to the wisp of glowing vine poking through it. "We need to freaking run." > > >< < < >> Hellcrawlers >> Hellcrawlers Ancient repairBugs beep, and rattle, back into their holes as we slump into a random maintenance room. Demon leaning hard against the table as we work to seal the doors. Zipper and Kami taking one each, while I ram my shoulder into a heavy crate of tools. Grunting. Shoving. Slamming it into the drone-hatch, and sliding down it. Then, almost as one, we turn to our [Berserker]. "Hey, like, you alright big guy?" "Za''dai un....." He rumbles, through barely opened lips. "Good. I am.... good. A moment is what is needed." We trade looks. "Lemmie see. You too, Kami." I say. "I''m fine." She grunts, while Demon stares for a second longer. "Kah. No. I am good. Pain fades. Wounds heal." He slams a fist into his chest. "See. Now better." "You-" I start, but his serious eyes stop me. Kami avoiding my gaze entirely. "If you says so." "Zha. I do." He nods, with a slash of that lion tail. Settling down. And that''s it. I turn. "Alright then." I growl. "We been hit pretty hard. We been done bad. But this ain''t over til the fat lady dies of a massive bloody heart attack..... Or however that bloody goes." "Are you calling me fat?" Kami falters. "Uh. No?" I blink back at the gaunt girl. "Anyway. We ain''t outta this yet. So take five, an'' we''ll rock out hard." I spin on the spot. "Ah! Polybius! Ya found us!" "Correct." Says the mess of noise and glitches above us. "Apologies for my absence. Local connectivity is fragmentary. I was forced to hijack a series of pumping-stations, substations, and nodes of The Old Internet." "Mate! Hey, like, y''know-" He coughs. "As per your instructions, I have dedicated several nodes to scouring the mainframe. All working videogames will be catalogued, and sent to you, as a first priority." "Brilliant, mate!" He grins, both thumbs up. I let off a wry snort. "Any actual intel?" "Hey, steady on." Kami scoffs at me. "Priorities, here." "Moon''s dataStick yielded scant intel related to our target." The Machine Mind clicks. "However, local servers contain more precise information." "Show me." A virtual map of the tower explodes from nothing, shining and blue. A red line snaking from our current position to the assumed target. This spins up toward us - layered by blueprints, images, and from ancient websites. In seconds, we''re looking at a full 3D walkthrough. Cameras. Electromagnetic. Traffic reports (crabspiders). Temperature (21c, in case you''re bloody interested). Humidity (dry). And a hundred million other things. Polybius has weird ideas about the word ''basic''. I try to grab our target from the air, but it fogs through my hand. The whole mass of information flickering with errors until I back off. My implant hot as flame in the side of my skull. Polybius regards me with alien eyes that tick with unfathomable clockwork. Meshing and unmeshing in ways that burn my fractured mind. And then the target location drops from the midst of the map, and flattens against the floor. Expanding into a live model built, directly, from their internal cameras. "And this is where things fall apart." Kami mutters, gently rubbing and flexing her ankle. We stare at the monster-infested nightmare. Fungal horrors, shambling. Spreading their festering spores. Slithering things loaded with seeds that pulsate and shiver. Twisted creatures eating their neighbours, and growing.... Wrongness. Utter wrongness bleeding up from every image. "Damn, mate. That''s freakish." Zip breathes. "Total devastation." "Well, yeah?" Kami''s pierced eyebrow rise. "What were you expecting? A GMO puppy playpen?" "Gotta hope, right?" Zip snorts. Triggering a quiet, feline, huff from the back row. "But, seriously. Are we actually-?" "It''s fake." I realise, very suddenly. Leaning forward. "What?" Zip blinks, as if coming out of a trance. Kami leaning around him. "I''ll repeat that. What?" "Look." I point at a doorway. A doorway to nothing. The creature half-way through it reappearing at the bottom of the map. My finger darts again, and another creature. It slides along a hallway, and.... stops existing. We look closer. The carpet of strange mushrooms broken in all kinds of weird places. A kitchen randomly attached to a bathroom cupboard. Another room stretched, awkwardly, so the monsters grow as they cross it. A thousand little things you could put down to errors. But together.....? "Shit, you''re right....." Kami breathes. "Polybius-!" Is as far as I get before The Machine Mind rips the map into parts. Adjusting them. Locking them back together, much more neatly. With far fewer voids. "Shit....." Kami leans back. "It''s a cut-n-shut. They taught us how to do these, back at-" Zip''s eyes are widening. "Mate. So. Where the Hell is the real one?" "Gone." Kami says. "It doesn''t exist. It''s been replaced. Whatever did this will have cut all lines into and out of the building. It won''t just be this one unit. It''ll be everything. Which means-" "Someone" I say, very slowly. "is in there." We all stare at the image. And then I slash it out of the way. "Don''t matter. Maintenance hatch is our way in." "Unless they''ve fricked up that map too." "Doesn''t matter." I repeat. "We play it by ear." I twitch mine. "We win." "Um...." Tufty whispers, after a second. "Ummm.....!" "C''mon shorite." His tail wraps tighter round his legs, and he shrinks into a little hunch. "H-how are we gonna get back??" I suck breath through my teeth. "....the power o'' friendship?" Zipper snorts, kicking himself up on a metal table. "Hey, like no sweat. Right? We''ll work something out, lil mate." "We will." I state. "Polybius. Work with Zip to find a new route." "Ah, crap. Well played." Zip mutters. "We shall win. We shall return." Demon growls, with surly surety and terrible force. Shaking huge horns free of his hood. His serious moment only slightly spoilt by Gremlin''s mischievous lil face peeping out of the side. Ruby eyes glimmering with evil as she catches a peak at her favourite ''snack''. Fingers. She latches on like a lil murder-limpet, and we all wince in sympathy as he yelps. Flailing and jumping about as the teenie-tiny horror flops like a wet noodle. Giggling all the way. Thirty seconds of extreme violence later, we manage to pry the ''little darling'' off him with our special ''anti-Gremlin warfare kit'' - aka treats, and a spatula. We then slap a bunch of GMO plasters over her mouth. And Demon. Leaving us free to eat the treats. "So. Game on, mate?" Our [Drone Tek] says, crunching through archaic crisps of some unknown flavour. I hesitate, eyes flicking between them. Zipper, expectant. Kami, scared and in pain - but trying to hide it. Gremlin a fuming lump. Tufty, hunched over a low crouch. Coiling his nervous tail around scrunched-up feet. Nibbling his biscuit with both hands. And Demon.... Demon gives me the same, solid, unshakeable look he always does. Unmoved by anything around him. Or, so he''d like you to think. "Yeah." I nod. "Game bloody on. Let''s go." We clear the opposite door, and step out. Polybius generating a green line on the ground to make up for my implant. I trace it up the silent stairs with Demon at my shoulder. Fungal trees radiating a deep and malicious light, as we skulk our way past an infested parking level. Exiting a sealed maintenance hatch into a tiny staff area, behind a front desk. The robotic receptionist barely spasms as we vault it. Landing in a vast, velveteen, lobby with pillars so tall it might once been a temple. Art deco lanterns pooling golden light on the red, red, red of the carpet. The colour so deep it seems to suck at the darkness. A crimson hallway, lined with rustling sheets of pale plastic. False walls that weave empty space into a treacherous maze. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it Once, it was a lobby. Then a field-hospital for the evacuation. Now its a graveyard. Possibly ours. Zip. Get those bees in the air. I breathe, as we crouch on the edge of that abyssal dark. Fingers close to the trigger. Eyes tracing across medical symbols from a long-gone age. "Supplies?" Kami breathes. "If we''re lucky...." I keep my nerve steady. Theres dry blood slashed up one of the plastic walls - a little too fresh, for my liking. A few bullet-holes in one of the sheets..... Tufty swallows, touching Demon''s tail - but yanking his hand away. "I c-c-an..... I can....." "It''ll be fine." I breathe. "We ain''t stupid." "But...." "Let''s find a wall." I mutter. Slipping past the wide, inviting, mouth of the field hospital. A small swarm of Zipper''s bees swirling up and over the sheets as I creep close to them. My steps are light and carefully placed. Touch down my little toes, then roll inward to spread the weight. I get low to it. I put one hand on the ground, and slide my gun under plastic. "Clear, mate." I slice open the thick plastic, and slip through. Cautiously. Into the little make-shift ward. Stepping over sleeping bags, and torn-open bones. And. claw marks. Wild rips in the carpet. And the plastic. The blood licked away. The skulls broke-open. I turn on the spot, and frown. "Attacked from every angle. All at once." I whisper. "Eaten alive. " Like we will be, if we aren''t quick, quiet, and careful. We dodge the fallen, and slash our way into a tiny office. Unveiling an empty chair, caked in dust. A merge desk. And an open view of the hallway, so quiet and dead it stills the heart. It''s a night station. For a nurse or a guard. I shiver, and rip my eyes away. Memories flickering. Kami tips her head out the hallway. "Poor lines of sight." "Weren''t set up by army, then." I mutter, turning back to the desk. Carefully, noting the lack of.... anything. No personality. No pictures. Nothing, except a small glassy device - which Kami quickly snags to sell. My eyes flick across the shifting plastic of the hallway, one last time, and then I cut us an exit. Gremlin leaping herself onto my helmet to peep through the hole as I do. Straining forward and blinking her huge, curious, eyes. I shake her off, with a jerk of panic, and hop through. Into a massive jumble and tumbling mess of torn luggage and burst holdalls. Shredded clothing, toys, and keepsakes scattered in every direction. There''s..... so much of it. A doll''s head bounces and skitters away from my foot as I drop to all fours. Eyes flicking across the formerly neat stacks. Unwilling witness to a thousand little lives. The broken guitar, its strings ripped open. The spilt handbag, leaking its contents. A lipstick. A tiny bear. A boy''s army play outfit, tossed to the side. Mangled. Chewed. A tin soldier caught in an actual war. Kami''s eyes shift from cool focus to insane rage. Flickers of anger that sparking through her mask, as if to set the whole pile alight. "They thought they were going to be safe." She whispers. Eyes lingering on a fragment of dress. A shoe. A formal tie, still half done up like a noose. Ready, waiting, to be slipped around a dead man''s neck. "We all kinda do." I whisper, as the world glitches. "Then we find we ain''t." "Can we go? Please? I can.... smell things....." Tufty hugs himself, and shivers at the core of the huddle. "Bad things...." Zipper blinks slowly, and looks away. Nodding. "Yeah, like, I ain''t up for looting this. Y''know?" Yes. Kami clutches her wrists with hard fingers. Just. Just, lets. Let''s go. I bounce out across the wreckage, and pause. Sniffing, quietly, at the air. I didn''t want to say it, but Tufty is right. Beneath the must, and decay, there''s something else. Something alien and unplaceable. Yet familiar. It''s getting stronger. A shadow breaks cover, and I whip my SMG toward it. Catching Gremlin in the crosshairs - hopping from stack to stack, and snuffling quietly. She digs at one, and chirps happily. "Gremmie! No." I hiss, flicking a hand at her. "Tastysss foodsss?" She chirps again. Hopping on the spot. The whole pile shifts. "Shhhh. C''mon...." I whisper. Hopping from briefcase to bag, as the others circle her. Demon scooping the tiny girl with some hesitation. "Shit, mate. I think I smell it too." Zip mutters, Kami frowning at the rest of us. "It''s gettin'' stronger." I admit, after a moment. "Like musky acid, and....." Tufty freezes, like he saw a predator, and we all go still. "What is it?" I mouth. But the cat is frozen. Green eye wide, and flickering, as the pile of fabric cases slip and shift beneath us. So very, very, slowly. My eyes slashing, out, across the vast space. Snagging on towers of cases. On corners, and cover. "Shit. I whisper. It''s a trap." And that''s when I hear it. A thing with too many legs, stirring in the black. Clickaty-click. Tap tap tap. I check my footing, and gesture to the others. Sliding backwards, slow, and careful. Our breath, and touch, the only sound in that infinite silence. Ears and eyes twisting in every direction. "Multiple." I whisper. "We got multiple." A little way ahead, the cases jump and shudder. Some bags sliding. Others bowing upward, and staying there, as something huge presses its way beneath the stack. Jolting my nerves with every subtle shift of fabric. "Go." Kami whispers. "Go go go." I shift a leg back, and the cases slide and skitter away. Too soft in all the wrong places. Too ready to slide and tip. And we''re already half-way across. I could make it. Tufty, and Gremlin, too. But Demon is heavy, and Kami can''t jump to save her life. She''s too awkward. Her body unbalanced by too many arms - forcing her into a slow, spidery, crawl as the cases jump like happy children around us. An avalanche shunts the ground beneath me, forcing my legs and arms apart. I roll, and cases slam down upon me. The wave of destruction splitting to rend the whole pile apart. Endless, oily-dark bodies, bursting from it in three different places. Glossy-dark things, wriggling the air with billions of tiny little legs. Waving and grasping, as they rise. And rise. And rise. Long, and slithering, and too fast to be real. Four massive mandibles, per mouth. All champing on spit and bile and air as they lock eyes with me. Eager, and hungry. As vicious light burning within randomly bulging eye-clusters. And then they bow their twisted heads, and fall upon us. Hammer fast. I kick a case into the air, and roll as fast as I can. My whole team scrambling as fourth and fifth waves blast, up, through the surface of the pile. Like feelers. Each one a vast, worming, thing with too many venomous tongues.. "WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY!?" Our [Sniper] screams. Hellcrawler!! I choke. IT''S A HELLCRAWLLER!!! "Wait, like, singular-" Thats. all. one. creature? Kami freezes as her mind finally comprehends the magnitude of what we face. Demon leaping, fully onto the leviathan insect. Ripping at legs and feelers in a terrifying rage. His mind lost in an instant as he goes utterly berserk. That frees me enough to spin onto my back, and hammer out a quad-shots at the head smashing toward me. Punching bullets through its fungal eyes. It rears back, in terrible silence, and the second head smashes into my chest. All legs, and biting, and mouth, and globular eyes. I plunge claws into them, and it jerks away. Knocking me sideways as a third takes sudden notice. Turning upon me, as four and five burst fully from the collapsed luggage. Limbs of a single beast, moving together. Rattling their too-many legs. Wrapping their hideous bodies to block our escape. Everything after that is a fractured whirl of images. Tufty panicked and leaping about, half way to fleeing. Demon tearing his way through the body of one as two others slam his back in turns. Kami taking cover beneath a tumbled stack, fighting to assemble her rifle. No teamwork. No plan. My eyes snap to the line drawn by Polybius. A direct route, right from my nose to the target. But do we risk it? What if it runs us into even more trouble? "Spook. I have infiltrated the cameras-" "SHIT! SHIT!" I scream as the mandibles grab Tufty. Yanking him up into the air, and shaking him like a toy. Kami''s huge rifle goes BAM as she ignites a rocket. Wrath and fire blooming from the sides as it spins up the smooth-bore barrel and snaps toward the neck of the Hellcrawler. With railgun assistance, that would be it. The thing would explode, and we''d be down one head of this horrific hydra. Except, it isn''t. She didn''t have time. "Spook. Listen." The unpowered shot slams itself into the creature, and stops. The massive thing stilled, suddenly. Yet there isn''t a single sound as it drops Tufty into the pile. Demon rushing to scoop the dazed kid, even as two other heads come smashing down where he lay. Shaking the floor. Lifts. I choke. LIFTS! Gremlin slashes past my face, in a trail of mad giggles. Biting. Clawing. Ripping open eyes. I fire again. and again, as we change course. Cutting between stacks of luggage that still stand tall. The thing a boiling mass of half-blinded heads as it fights to keep us in its circle. Kami''s armour flashing bright with gold as she snaps out of existence. Her ghostly image a jarring mess of static and angles that- I rip my eyes away to fire at the huge, leggy, thing swarming down at my face. Smashing its face open with a heavy, charged, shot. But it''s ready. It tanks the bullets, and grabs me by the waist. "NO! NO-" The world twists up and away from my grasping feet. The fallen hospital a distant maze, far beneath me. Crawling with strange shapes. Kami is screaming. Demon a manic blur, leaping off the hard shells of suitcases. Then, everything turns blurry and confusing. My head snapping backward and forward - protected by the adaptable brace om my neck. I can''t scream. I can''t breathe., its got me so tight. Then, a green streak hits me from beneath - and I''m falling. Tufty clamped around me. I scream. The world a white-hot whirl of- I hit the suitcases, and bounce. Tumbling. Rolling. Tufty letting go, as warnings flare across my vision. Impact. Impact. Impact. I roll to a dizzy stop, and suck in air. My thoughts compacting to a sullen bead of infernal heat. Rage. Pure, cold, and hot enough to melt your insides. All of my claws grip suitcase. Toes. Fingers. Clenching tight as the Hellcrawler''s heads sway to a stop in midair. Confused. Its many fat bodies sniffing for meat as the others go still. Because they know what it just did. I crick my neck. I settle my eyes. Tossing my SMG to Tufty. And then I whisper it. Omega Protocol: Spook. A click. A pwissssh. And white-hot nitro-glycerine FURY explodes through my veins. A madness. A wild, incalculable, feeling of absolute terrifying clarity. The whole world sluggish, and jagged, around me. And so very, very, very, simple. My head snaps to a point roughly central to the heads, and I kick off the suitcase so hard it bursts. My hands hit another, and I flip into the air. Bouncing from point to point. It sees me coming. It won''t help. Nothing will. I am unstoppable, and that damn thing is IN MY WAY. I backhand one of its heads, and it ruptures from the force. I claw another, and the eyes pop like fat berries. And then I''m past them. Flipping from case to case as I target the thickest body, with the most horrible - wiggly - legs. I hit it like a fist through a bag of guts. Bursting fluids and carnage as I literally tear my way into its scuttling belly. Finding no bone, no organs, only a hollow throat lined with armoured shell and muscle. I rip at it. I tear. I scream. And I rend my way through. Finding myself in a pulsating tunnel of death. A squeezing, shifting, rolling tube designed to suck me down and down into a the underworld. I drop my last frag in it, and run. Behind me, the other heads recoil and then slam upon me. Heavy and thick. I rip at them. I make bloody wounds. Demon by my side - so wild it''s like he took a shot of Omega himself. The others barely a blur of afterthought as I try to rip my way out through the back of its head. A low, sudden, boom shakes the fallen stacks. A flicker of light up the throats of the beast. And then, slowly, two of the heads simply fall over and die. The whole creature thrown into a chaos of smashing and flailing and skittering and legs. And legs. And legs. And- I roll myself free and Zipper grabs my arm. Kami the other. "We have to bloody go!" She screams. "SHIT! Did you give Tufty a gun!? Are you insane!?" "KILL." I snarl, with vicious joy. "RIP IT APART!! AN'' ANY BASTARD WHO TRIES T''STOP ME!!" "Mate! No! We gotta go! Pol worked it out!" "KILL! BURN! BREAK! KILL!" "Mate! Like, that''s the brood mother!" "PISS OFF! I GOTTA KILL! I GOTTA-" "No! You don''t get it! It''s gonna-" Quit suddenly the three remaining heads rear back to let out a long, eerie, whistle like the final note of shattering glass. A note that goes on and on and on until I feel my ears numb, and my mind fog. As if the thing never, ever, ever needs to breathe. And then.... from out in the maze..... ....a thousand shrilling wails answer back. >>><<< >> Many Little Legs >> Many Little Legs
## battleTek System Self Diagnostic: Complete ### WARNING :: [Heartrate] of user [Spooky_Hardass] is [irregular]! WARNING :: [Irregular vitals] may cause damage to L.M.G. Property! WARNING :: Damage to L.M.G. Property is an act of Treason! ## Glory to The Great Leaders! Glory to the neoSoviet Empire! ##
My aim jerks and shivers as liquid ice rattles in my veins. The plastic maze a blur as I force my malfunctioning body to run. Colours smearing into a mess of chaos. Faces twisting into a mad, rictus, blur of features. I stumble, and the others catch me. Heart stuttering. Cold fire eating my insides. The SMG a sweaty, guilty, weight in my freezing hands. Flashing hot, in sudden bursts, as the RAGE burns itself out in fits. We pile into a corner of an empty ward, behind a desk, as the plastic walls come alive with hideous shapes. Hellcrawlers. Big as cars, or even trucks. Each one a mass of tangled bodies filling the entire hallway. Creeping under sheets. Sniffing at the air. Ever silent, except when they call to the wounded brood mother. It''s still not dead. "It''s all on you. Find us a way." Kami mouths to Zipper, as I fight my chattering teeth. Sinuous heads twisting knots of shadow against the thin walls. His bees rise as one, and spread into a humming blanket above us. Unveiling a tangled mess of star-shaped Hellcrawlers spreading in every direction. "How smart are they, y''think?" He mumbles back, and I gesture to them. Only one way to find out. I grab a gnawed human bone, and toss high over plastic-sheet walls. It tumbles. Tumbles. And- A nasty THWACK as it hits a plastic wall. Way too many heads whip around, and the nightmare things outside.... slide..... away. Followed by numerous others. But the damned things are fluid as Hell, and not all of the Hellcrawler heads are taking the bait. Some just sit there. Evil, and sinuous, and wrong - and waiting. I toss another bone after the first. Silence, this time. Must have hit carpet. I throw again, and again. Getting a couple more hits. Many blunt, bulging, heads jerk to follow the sound. Little legs thumping carpet in an evil rhythm as that whole freakish heap of creature swirls along the plastic passageway. Mandibles chattering and snipping. Compound eyes flickering with hideous glints of mad intent as they nose beneath our walls. We slip out out the actual door of the room - into a rustling hallway, barren of life. Old lights burning circles of deep and vivid red into the soft and dusty carpets. I shiver in my armour, wiping tears of frozen sweat from my chin as we creep past medical symbols from an ancient age. Plastic rattling behind me, as if shaken by unseen hands. Ahead, as monsters tap-tap-tap against the walls. My ears focused, keenly, on the rising susurrus of many-legged movement. I break into a shaky run as the others drag me. Dodging billowing sheets, torn loose by the monsters, as Zipper chants directions like a spell. Guiding us round corners. Under flaps. And away from the roiling, nightmare, tangles of bodies and legs. Tiny star-shaped Hellcrawlers slowing up the sides of pillars, and sheets. We stop at a corner, and peer around it. Breathless, and quiet. Eyes darting as a massive, tangled, shape floods the intersection ahead. Unfolding in a leggy mess of long bodies and gleaming eyes. "Back. Back." I hiss, and we slip away as the thing spills outward to fill the space around it. Almost swirling, yet somehow delicate. It must be how they hunt..... "Lifts ahead-d-d. One h-hundred yards." I chatter, shuffling my hunched weight. The colours of the world shifting, strangely, as we circle round the thing in the intersection. Quietly. Carefully. Pacing ourselves, and keeping low. Ready to run, or shoot, at the least opportunity. "Spook, mate, you doin'' okay? You ready to, like....." "Fine." I hiss through clenched fangs. "Never better." "More coming." Demon warns, with a low snort of distain. "Their senses aren''t great, at least." Kami whispers. "They seem to feel with their legs, mostly." "Don''t count on it." I grunt. "There. Lifts. C''mon." We slide through the last wall, and out into a wide, bench-filled, space. A row of golden doors gleaming with etched reliefs. All trees, and shadowed woods. My team slinking along the edge of it as we circle around to- I stop. Suddenly. "Looks good, mate." Zip breathes. "No. Can''t ya feel it?" I twist my head around. "We''re being followed." "Dash for it?" Kami asks. "No. Somethin'' feels wrong." I murmur back. Still fighting to find my legs, but steadily winning. "Slow. Steady. Eyes open. Tufty, with me." "O-okay Spook." He blinks as Kami''s eyes fix, tight, on the kid. Fingers flexing. Forcing him to shiver and lower his eyes. "Be careful." She warns me, that huge rifle humming with imminent violence. "No handing him live weapons. He''s lucky he dropped it." Her eyes burn. "Very. Lucky." "Shut it. It was bloody locked." I hiss, whispering away in a curl of tail and darkness. Our catboy a nervous, shivery, lump in my shadow as we thread through the rows of benches. It''s a damn shame we couldn''t hit the supplies room, what with the current massive hunt on. But maybe on the way back, when it''s settled down a bit..... I shiver again. The sensation of eyes chilling my frozen neck. Numb fingers tight on the SMG as I fight to keep calm. Every step a quiet breath of impact on the dusty carpet. The sense of eyes growing, and growing with every instant. Senses jarring inside me as ears and eyes swivel in opposite directions. As if that crawling, creeping, hideous thing is reaching its wriggling legs toward me..... Even now..... But nothing..... nothing..... Am I imagining it? Did the [battleStim] make me paranoid, or-? A sudden clatter of light slashes dark, like an old film running off its reel. My whole body jerking, as my head snaps around. Facing the source, right as a brash and terrifyingly familiar voice roars out across the vast space. Thick with terror, and pain, and urgency. My wild eyes fixating on something so utterly improbable I could never have seen it coming. If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. "Badger.....?" I whisper, as the kid jumps and screams and waves. His face caked in muck and blood. His armour festooned by wires, and tiny blinking lights. "SPOOK!! SPOOK!" He bellows, waving hard with his clunky robotic hand. "What....." I breathe. "WHAT." No. Not waving. Pointing. Pointing- I leap, and slam into Tufty. Carrying him into a blind, bone-rattling, roll as the second biggest Hellcrawler I''ve ever seen crashes down upon us. Its thick, tangled, core landing exactly where we were. Crushing benches. Pounding plastic plants into bright green bits. But it''s way, way, too big. The splayed bodies encircling us. Slamming inward. Wrapping us in its horrible, leggy, coils as gleaming segments roll in crushing waves. Shining and pulsating and flexing. Hitting us from both sides, then parting to hammer us again. Trying to stun us. Trample us. Break all our bones. But my Dominion 5 armour shifts and flexes with impact. Leaving us to stagger and fight for balance, finding it as the monster''s coils swaying open again. And I realise I''ve got no choice. We are in deep, deep, crap and Tufty is frozen. Overwhelmed. I.... I need to get him out, right now. And I can''t let my fear get in the way. What bloody good is terror if I let him die? No thought. Just do it. I grab him under the armpits, and jump onto the shining wax-slick back of the nightmare star. Leaping again, and again, as a huge purplish head roars down on me. Forcing me to bounce and skip through the chaos of twisting bodies. Jaws slamming right in my face as it tries to pincer our damn heads off. I boost myself clear, and inhale a scream. Hurling the cat away from me. And there I hang, suspended in whistling air. Tail blown out being me. Wind roaring through fingers and toes, and ears, and everything. Staring out over the great, mangled, maze of the medical camp as hundreds of monstrous star-shapes swirl toward us. Rippling under the plastic walls, and up the pillars. Charging across the ceiling, like the massed forces of a demon hoard. SPOOK!!! MONSTERS!!! Badger screams in renewed confusion and terror. As if seeing them all again, for the very first time. I feel my breath catch, as I spin. Head over legs, in a twist of tail. But I''ve got no time to even think, as feet impact the cool plastic pillar and my SMG snaps to my hand. The voices of my team smashing through the fog of battle to blare bright and loud in my ears. "GET!" I scream, kicking off the pillar into a spin above the creature. Upside-down. Gun aimed high above my head, as it passes beneath me. "TO!" Four bullets ride a wave of rage and Hellfire from the weapon. "THE LIFTS!" BOOM. The rising head meets rail-assisted rocketry, and bits of it splatter. The mouth open wide, and silently screaming, as it reaches to snag me. Flailing its billions of legs as I fire again. Trailing curls of smoke and rage as I kick off one of its heads to hit the second pillar. My gun a blasting hate and death upon it as I spin towards a third. Feeling and hearing, rather than seeing, the others rally to the battle beneath me.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 344/440
Kick number four, and the vile abomination wraps its many bodies around the pillars. Crawling up them, like some insane elevator from the darkest and most twisted corner of Hell. Demon hauling an inert Badger under one arm as he claws and kicks. Zipper firing tight, controlled, bursts at a flat angle. Keeping his fire away from me. DEMON! ZIPPER! TUFTY! I scream in absolute desperation, drawing the Hellcrawler. "YOU''RE ON DEFENCE! KAMI!! GET READY! WERE KILLING THIS BASTARD! "DEEEEEEEEEFFeeeence." The Hellcrawler crows in a sudden, uncanny, mimicry of my voice. Every one of us stumbling. "Oh." I whisper. "Shit." But it''s too late. I kick off a writhing millipede as another come slavering down upon me - mandibles slashing and grinding. "Spook." Kami breathes in my ear, over comms. "I need a shot on the core." My eyes narrow. "Got it." I jink sideways, smashing a fat neck aside with my gun as I plunge into the beast. Fighting downward, in panic, as it pushes me ever up and up - toward the distant, ornate, ceiling. Its too damn close for rockets. Fear choking me inside. The chills still earing my skin. But I know exactly what Kami is thinking. I dive for the inner core of the monster - the roiling heart of the star. It follows me, and I skid off its sides. Its belly. Gremlin a wild, red shape - blasting past my face. Doing pinprick damage, but sending the thing wild as it tries to snatch at her. Demon a golden blur of violence as he smashes his way through caprice and gore. Ahead, I see it. A heavy knot of disgusting legs and joined bodies, all melted and fused together at random. And, as the coils begin to implode upon us, I realise that getting in was never the problem. I bounce off its loops at hideous speed, rattling down to the very centre of the madness. Bounding and flipping and tying it in knots. Or trying to. The damn thing is smart, and its freakin everywhere. Closing me in. Oh shit! Its going for the death-roll! I yell. Flipping over a thick body to escape its crushing, wiggling, jittering, embrace. Spook! Come on! I dont have line of sight! Ill give you a mark! I choke back. Bashing a snatching head aside. Firing into the mouth of another. It might not punch through- Just! Bloody! TRY! I scream as mandibles crunch my left elbow, and swing. Cracking armour. I stab my combat-knife right into its face, and twist away. More bodies slamming into the spot I occupied. Legs are tiring. It''s frenetic, up here. Wild, panicking, adrenaline in my blood as the floor looms wide and heavy. Crawling with star-shaped things that should not exist. Abominations unto everything that is. And then, suddenly. I see it. An opening. Right into the boiling heart. I grab a flare from my belt. One of only three. And then I fall. Zpook! Badger is in lift! Demon crackles, but I''m way too committed. And this thing is way too smart. I hit the core. Hundreds of smaller bodies writhing around me, like offshoots. SPOOK! Flare! I scream, popping the cap off the sticky end. The whole monster imploding in on my position as I stab it in deep. The smaller bodies screaming and writing. NOW! Aim just below it! And I pull the ripcord. Dropping through the masses of biting, slashing, groping, coiling forms. My whole head jarring with thunderous noise as vicious jets of roaring blue fire scream from the side-vents of her gun. Ending in a massive bloom of death from the barrel. A line of light tracing the distance between her and the Hellcrawler''s core. BOOM! The rocket bursts through monster, exploding weird fluids in every direction. The whole horde of monsters jerking in its wake - including the one Demon has by the throats. But then, nothing. "Shit! Dud!" I scream. "No, you idiot! Move! Move!" She roars, as I plunge through the coils. Suddenly, horribly, aware that I was far higher up than I thought. Demon hurling the smaller Crawler aside as he slams in on all fours to catch me. My whole world shrinking to him, and the floor, as I panic-fire grapples. He leaps toward me. I reach down to him. And then Kami triggers the explosive round, and the king of The Hellcrawlers comes apart like a puzzle. Massive bodies shielding me from the dim flash as a second BOOM rolls across the hall. The panic it causes arriving almost before the blast, as huge sections of the colossal creature rain down around me. My arm jerks as the grapple takes, tearing free of my suit. The armour locking to prevent it taking my damn arm off. I hit the rising Demon like a wrecking-ball, and I suddenly realise his plan. "N-" He smashes, back first, into the floor. With me on top. Right as the monster falls around us. Huge chunks of it detonate with a splattering roar as Tufty bounds in. Grabbing for my hand. I recoil from both of them, and curse. Then I grab one of Demon''s arms, and he gets the other. The two of us dragging him, fast as we can, as the carpet turns slick and dreadful. Masses of gunk splattering us both as we dodge, and weave, and the thing above comes utterly undone. Me firing wild eignt-shot [Burst]s into the closing horde. "LIFT! LIFT!" I yell as the other Hellcrawlers go absolutely wild. Half descending on their fallen master in a frenzy of feeding. The others still rolling toward us, even as parts of the creature smash the smaller ones flat. Even as we kill them. Two seconds of frantic dragging, and I duck as Zipper skids in on the side. Purple blood spraying as he carves a massive fan of fire through the monster behind us. More coming as he guards our retreat. Kami skidding in on the other side, cursing her goopy boots as she fires off her remaining pistols. Plastic sheets falling as the core of the Hellcrawler King falls from on high. Still thrashing its death-throws as the others begin to feed. I fire again, and again. Leggy bodies torn open as I fire behind me, again and again. All the way, until we pile into the lift. Slamming Badger to the wall as I hit the button in a machine-gun beat. Dropping to my knee as me and Zip and Kami empty everything weve got into the things that are coming. My mag extension snapping off with a ping as I drop bellow 220. Filling the lift with rocket-smoke as it finally snips shut on all that''s pouring toward us. Silence rules for a single second, and then the horde hits metal. Bucking against the door. Clawing. Scrabbling. Ripping at their friends. Spitting. Biting. Slashing with strange legs, as the lift carries us down. And down. Down, and down, into the quiet bowels of The Undercity. Leaving us, in rattling quiet. And then, as one, they freaking scream. A single piercing note. Endless and hideous, and howling. Echoing down the shaft. Carried away from us, by the plunging lift, until it''s nothing but a whisper. >>><<< >> Forgotten Threads >> Forgotten Threads
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 196/220
Nightmare sounds dwindle, and we all collapse into a dribbly mess on the floor of the lift. Well, except Tufty - who launches at Badger to hug him and check he''s okay. And Kami, who tries to pry him off - with limited success. And, uh, Gremlin - who skips all about us in hyperactive excitement. Happily chewing a horrible, monstery, leg. So just me then. And Demon, who slumps hard against the back wall. Tended by a pale-looking Zipper. "You okay, big guy?" I ask our [Berserker], knowing full well what the reply will be. %he exact one he''d give if his spine was snapped. "Zha." He nods, eyes sharp and golden. "Fine." I hesitate, sharing a glance with Zipper. Then I sigh out my resignation, and lean back to shut my eyes. Letting the old metal box sing me a lullaby of creaking groans as it worms its way down into impossible depths. My breath still panting out in rough bursts. My armour oiled with sweat and unnameable goo. My whole body wrung out, weirdly sticky, and wired as Hell. It''s everywhere. My face smeared with gunk. My fingers, toes, Hell even my damn nose. And still, I shiver. Chilled by something deeper than cold. Damn..... that." I choke out at last. "That was freakin crazy..... "Hellcrawlers, mate." Zip unfurls his grimy helmet as Kami scans a grudging Demon''s ribs and back. "Yeah. That. But not just that. That ain''t even the bloody start." My moist tail flicks as I turn to glare at my real target. So. Thought yad follow us? Huh? YEAH!! I SURE DID!!!! Badger flails, happily, from inside his aggressively protective Tufty-hug. Cause what if you needed some HUGE THING blown up!?! You''d be all like ''oh no! I don''t got a Badger! Wot do I do???'' And I''d be like ''''WOOOO!! Here I am!!!'' And you''d be totes- I slam a hand into the side of the lift, and the pair jump clean off the floor. I TOLD YOU!!!! STAY IN THE BASE!!" I scream. "YOU COULDVE DIED!!! WHAT IF-!?" I choke out. Heaving and shaking as I crawl toward him. "What if you died!? Ya lil idiot!!? What if you died? Joan made me bloody promise I''d look after ya!" "And I super promised too! In secret!" He beams, crossing his fingers and toes. "I''ll look after Spook! I double-ultra-MEGA promise!!" "You can''t!!! You just can''t!!" I roar back, making him blink. "You''re bloody snack-size to those things! You don''t even got a gun!" "Bitesize." Kami injects. "Crumb sized." "You''re hopeless." I breathe, willing the boy to understand as I reach for him..... and let my hand fall away. "You just.... you.... hopeless..... Why can''t I stop you? You just keep bleedin'' wandein'' off into bleedin'' monster nests!" "I don''t!!" He huffs. "YOU DID! YOU JUST DID! We JUST got bloody swarmed by em! Twice! What if you''d gotten bloody eaten?" I shudder, and grip my face. "Monsters bloody everywhere!! You coulda got eaten.....! And I''d never have even known! I''d be looking forever, and I''d..... I''d never find you...... Badger''s big eyes blink up at me, slow and brown and soft. He looks at Tufty. He looks at Kami. Then back at me, forehead wrinkling. Head titling. And then he says something that drills ice and terror into my heart. Huuh!?" He blinks again. "What monsters??? We all stare at the kid. Then at the ghastly, twitching, Hellcrawler leg in Gremlin''s happy gob. "Spook." Says Kami, in a slow and cautious voice. "Did I just hear that right?" "I''m wonderin'' that too." I stutter out. Leaning on one arm, and shaking. "Badger....?" "WOOO!! YEAH!!! YOU REALLY DO NEED ME!!!" He waggles happily. "No- You- Dumb...... Squirt-" I malfunction, horribly. "He''s suppressing, mate." Zip says, cautiously. "Gotta be." I blow a breath. "I guess. Maybe." "Or he''s just too daft." Kami smirks, ruffling the kid''s mess of hair. Which, in accordance with how often Badger brushes, actually makes it neater. And I sit there. Re-picturing the fight. I want it to be simple. For him to be my lil idiot. For him to be oblivious to the horrors, and just..... But no. He called out to us. He saw the Hellcrawlers first. He warned me. So what is this? What''s going on? "Badger." I say, very slowly. "How many scary critters did ya see? On the way up here?" "Uhhh.....?" He blinks at me, then rummages in the horrid recesses of his satchel. Producing something six-legged and hairy, with too many eyes. "I saw this one!! I call him Sir Boris, Destroyer Of Snacks! Cause he ate all of mine!" We all regard the terrifyingly ratlike abomination unto God, nature, and common sense. It regards us right back. Somehow, there is comradery. "Is it me, or is that thing kinda cute?" Kami voices, after a moment. "Yeha......" I squint. "They usually are. Right up until they lay eggs in ya eyeballs." "Lucky all ours are plastic." Kami adds, quickly, as Gremlin''s lil head perks up. "Yums yumssss?" "No! Eyeballs are not yum yums!" I state emphatically. "Butsss.....?" A little head tilt. "Yumsss yumss tho?" I sigh. "And I was bloody worried about the rat-thing." Like magic, Gremlin''s head swivels toward Sir Boris. Who Badger, promptly, shoves back in his bag with a lil "EEP!" "Wanna prerecord the funeral?" Kami snorts, as Gremlin hops down to investigate the bag. Snuffling eagerly, and pawing at it. "NOOO!!! Sir Boris!" Badger wails as he swats her away. Which, of course, activates feisty-pounce-giggle-butt-wiggle-murder-mode..... until Demon reaches out and squashes her flat. "Immai." He grumbles, in that weird language of his, keeping his hand flat until she behaves. Or something roughly bloody adjacent to it. I glance back at the others. The lift shuddering, imperceptibly, as Polybius runs it up and down. Giving us time to rest. But though we try again and again, we don''t get much more out of Badger. Just a lot of babble about how he "followed" us "super secret ninja style! KAPOW!" and that it was "DOUBLE ULTRA MEGA BRUTAL!". Oh, and he got totally bloody lost after we ''locked him out'' on the bridge. Which was about when I told Kami to "begin the throttling". It didn''t help. And so I''m left to wonder, and ponder, and worry as the lift coughs its last. A frown on my face as we roll out into the cool, silent, darkness of a lost hyperloop station. Scanning a darkness that presses in against the edges of our light. Stroking the grim white tiles of a hollowed-out train-station. Their shining surface cast in dim, unreal, colours cast by a fallen ''Exit'' sign. Abandoned stalls, caked in thickest dust, loom at us from between thick pillars. The powder worked deep into every chocolate wrapper. Every roll of fruity chews. Every cup of coffee, left in silence where it fell. The sheer emptiness of the place hits like a granite wall. Endless, unbroken, and balefully watchful. Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Emptiness, with a mind. With a soul. With a hunger. Broken lights reducing the tiles to islands of shadow and yellowy light. An old sign cutting the dark with its dim, impatient, blinks.
Welcome To Jubilation! New Quebecs Finest station! Je me souviens, Quebec.
Huh. This tower had a name. Kami murmurs to the sign. Her breath stirring tiny fronds of dust as she wipes it away with a rubberised finger. Yeah. All the towers did, back when. Big hopeful ones, full of cheer. I shake my head. "Didn''t do them no good." "We remember Quebec...." Kami frowns as her implant translates, then her eyes burn dark. "No you bloody don''t. And now, nobody remembers you....." She smears her hand across the sign, as if to scrub it away, but turns from it with a shudder. "Come on. Work to do." We glance at Zipper, but he shakes his head. Like I said, we all got our damage..... I turn as well, and we whisper away into a pristine labyrinth of tiles and turnstiles. A shaky, shivering, Tufty catching Badger by the hand and shushing him quiet as the stillness overwhelms us. The void of a space once filled to the brim with hurried people now turned desolate.... and eerie. Automated trains, deep bellow, puffing whispers of wind through the station. Rattling wrappers the only travellers there will ever be again. Except for us. Kami splits the terrible two, and we slip deeper into the concourse. My implant rapidly glitching, horribly, through different languages as it tries to translate the signs that decorate the walls around us. Text flickering. Jarring. Peeling off the walls, to glitch and crack the air around my head. Unseen by all but me.
?? Sada e Elevadores Toilettes ?? ?? Estacionamento ͏d ??
I shut it all out as we slip under a flashing emergency shutter. Entering the vast and silent station. Fast food kiosks, dead with dust. Lifts jamming open and shut, as if to admit the ghosts of the ancient dead. We slip past them all. Past escalators churning endlessly on and on. Past symbols for the Blue Line, and Orange. Past broken [ERROR]s that rip at my reality. Tearing free to fill the air with static and light. It''s getting worse. But I''ve got to ignore it. Our shapes flicking shadows as we leap the turnstiles for the Hyperloop. My hand hitting the card sensor as I flip over the top. Demon kicking off it, right after, as Kami grunts and spider-crawls. Pulling herself over. Tufty lands atop the barrier beside her, in a shaky crouch. Peeking over the edge as as Badger squirms and pops through the gap underneath. He gets stuck, rips free, and leaps up in exultation. Fists rising. Inhaling rapidly. Zipper tackles him in a blur of blue. Hand over mouth. And we all hold our breath as the dead station rumbles. Distant shadows shivering as Demon''s clawed hands flex and glint. His horned head snapping from noodle-bar to sushi-stand as we eye the shadowy kiosks. Worse things than Hellcrawlers out there..... I flick gesture, and we slip down the long tunnel to the loop. Hopping ourselves onto a rolling staircase of giddying, gut-gnawing, height. My claws biting rubber banister as it carries us down, and down, into the belly of another tower. Burrowing us deep into the silence and the stillness. Signs flickering, awakening, as we pass. Hologram starfighters blast free from some long-dead movie, shooting out rainbow bolts of excitement. A butler leaning down to offer us a tray of golden-clad balls that Badger tries to take. A sultry women, in a bright red dress, coyly puffing perfume like we all know damn well who she is. And all the while Normals, dressed up as GMOs, dance up and down silvery divider. Singing a song from some old play that will never exist again. A king of beasts upon a great, sharp, rock. But all of it, nameless. The very words burnt away to flickering, mutating, symbols by time. And the damage to my implant. No longer one language, but many. Hundreds. Thousands. Meaningless glyphs, jumbled beyond all knowledge. And beneath all the static and chaos.... I hear a faint, yet gradually rising, tone. A half-heard thing that flutes and flutters in the far-away distance..... A note of dire warning. Or the aftershock of a terrible bell sunk deep under water. I shut my eyes, and shiver, as holes of darkness and wireframe light break the tunnel around me. Twisting my friends, by fractional degrees, into digital mockeries of life. Kami nudges me and I stir. Lifting my toes, on reflex, to catch the end of the escalator as we hop off into the station itself. Following bright gold markings down to The Sun Plaza Line, past numerous others. All vowing to carry us away to places so long gone they may as well be fiction. Neo Singapore. Nouvelle-France. And the vast heights of the grand New British Empire. All of it lost forever. Fallen to dust, and shadows. Just like Quebec. We slip past hallways into unknown places, and down again. Adverts for yoghurt splaying out above abandoned spots for buskers who will never play. A quiet emptiness stirred, not simply with dread. Or fear. But with that pressure-shift of awareness you only get in subways late at night. Its a place of transitions, not people. An nowhere place at the crux of this vast, forgotten, crossroads. If Purgatory exists, it''s like this. A lonely old subway stop on the long, rattling, ride to Hell. I lick dry lips, as Demon steers a shivering Tufty onto the left-hand platform. The camera above following our steps as we walk all the way to the curtain of energy shimmering at the edge. The tunnels, on either side, little more than a line of dim lights plunging away into bottomless pits of black. I flatten my hand against the curved field, and it buzzes and stings me. "Shit." "Be advised." Polybius hums through the local tannoy. "Hyperloop systems are not normal trains. What exists beyond that veil is pure, and absolute, vacuum. This eliminates air resistance, allowing the trains to achieve massive speeds. Suspended, as they are, in a levitation field." "But?" I grin. "This section of The Loop is one of the most damaged, locally. Breathable levels of air are expected for most of your trip." I frown. "Most?" "The station is still depressurised." The hyperloop timetable glitches as Polybius takes it over. Displaying a long tube broken into sections. "As is one other section along your route." We share a look. "You can vent it?" "Pressurise." The Machine Mind corrects. "I cannot. The systems are hardwired to prevent remote tampering." "Well. Shit." I grin, as Tufty and Gremlin chase the rat thing about the station - pursued by a frantic Badger. "Guess we better do some rewirin''. Where''s the box?" My implant almost shatters as Polybius highlights a discrete, blank-faced, security door. But Kami and Zip break it open in a matter of moments, leading us into the hidden guts of the facility. Low lights. Concrete walls. A messy break-room. And a door stamped with an overly cheerful black-and-yellow lightening bolt. The kind that indicates ''fun stuff inside''. I lean back out. "Oi! Shortie squad! Get over here!" Tufty yelps, and stiffens, mid rat-murder-pounce. Lands, delicately, and- Badger blunders right into his side, crying "SIR BORRIS!!!" Bowling him over into a tangled mess of yowling limbs, which Gremlin happily takes full bloody advantage of. Swiping. Giggling. Biting tasty ears and noses, while the rat-thing scurries under a bin. I blink. Zipper snorts. Kami scowls. "I told you! Keep away from the cat." She growls, storming over to drag Badger out by the leg. "KAMI! You saved me!" "Yeah, yeah." She grumbles, grumpily. "C''mon." I grin as Demon edges over to retrieve a feisty Gremlin from under the bin. "But Sir Boris!" "He''ll be fine." I promice. "Or not." Kami grins. "Hopefully not." "BORRIS!" But she drags him off down the hall, regardless. And, soon after, we breach the seal on the second door with a thick hisss. Sliding down the short ladder, onto a gantry maze of metal and sifting light. Drones skittering off, deep, into a world of tangled cables - thick as my neck. I settle feet onto the punched metal, and slip a look over the side. Into a dark world of wires and pipes and machines from a lost and long-ago time, before all memory. Not far down, at least. Biting treads grip our skin as we worm our way past massive engines of unknowable function. Past glass tubes, filled with light. Past beads of humming, harmonic, energy that flick along tubes. Fighting our way through, into a long and awkward room - directly beneath the platform itself. It''s entire length stuffed with ancient metal that pulses back against the ravages of time. "Gotta be old, mate." Zip whistles. "Like, real old. Y''know? Maybe founding of the The City old." "Which ''founding''?" Kami says, wryly, from somewhere inside a control box. Her face aglow with buttons and blinking lights. He blinks. "Like, The Beginning? Right?" Kami snorts. "Which beginning?" "None o'' that." I growl, pointing upward. "See that big ole row o'' nodules runnin'' along the ceiling, end to end? Bet that''s right along the platform edge." I grin as Gremlin lands on the machine my my face. "Which means that''s the tek runnin'' the barrier. We drop that, an'' we''re in." "Can we.... explode it? Can we?" Badger gasps in a giddy little whisper. Clutching his cheeks. My eyebrow cocks. "And by ''we'' we mean ''you''? Right?" A furiously fast nod. "Not a chance, shortie." I snort. "That ain''t originTek, but it''s pretty damn close. We''re gonna salvage it on the way back. Well, much as we can carry." "Buut? Buuuut? Can''t I help?" He wibbles, pathetically. Reaching out to me with noodly arms. "Not a chance, kid. I still remember the last time ya ''helped''." "So does the media." Kami coughs. "And what''s left of New Texas." I add, with a wince. "Anyway, we''re dallyin'' here. Kami, hit the thing." She nods, and something deep in the guts of the control box goes click. Followed by a Hellish ''BRAWWP!-BRAAWWP!'' of kaxons as the whole room flashes red. Metal shrieking and shuddering as the machines trigger an emergency shutdown. An instant later, I hear the result above - a massive pocket of vacuum unleashed into the waiting air with a roaring BANG that knocks dust off the walls and shakes the walkway beneath us. "All clear?" I yell into the ringing silence, as our ears pop. Pulling myself upright. "WOOO! BRUTAL!!! Implosions are still ''plosions!" Badger cheers, spinning happy circles until he falls over. Because, of course, he would be the first to recover. Zip wrenches himself upright. "Mate, like what? Thought it was gonna.... y''know, like?" "Equalise slowly? It was supposed to." Kami growls. "Must have hit the wrong button." "Or the right one!" Badger giggles manically. "WOO!!! Do it again!!" `"Shhhh!" I growl. "C''mon....." We slip up the stairs to a platform in total disarray. The track a chaos of crisp-packets, surprised bug-drones, and other debris. "Bloody Hell, mate. Glad we weren''t caught in that." Zip says, as Badger''s ''new rat friend'' pops its eyebally head out of the mess. Looking more than a little dizzy. "Sir Boris!!" Badger whoops, swinging the dizzy rodent/thing in mad circles. "Oh goodie." Kami says. "It survived." "No worries. We can murder it later." I tease. "Heeey!!! Noo!!" Badger huffs, skidding to a stop. "It''s for his own good!" Kami cheers like a six-armed schoolteacher, electing even more huffs. I snort, and shake my head. Static buzzing skin as I drop into the curved belly of the hyperloop track. Turning to stare down that endless, hypersonic, tunnel into absolute infinity. And the absolute unknown. I crack my neck as the others drop down behind me. Zipper and Tufty landing light. Demon, heavy. Kami tottering on the curve as she staggers down. But then we focus. Weapons ready. "Alright." I grin. "Get ya game on. Cause this is it....." It''s time to take our first piece of The Left Hand. > > >< < < >> The Freakshow >> The Freakshow Air screams vengeance through the tunnel above us. The sealed hatch of the tiny control-pod shuddering, flexing, and leaking air as the pressure equalises with a BOOM of thunder to equal the clouds above. A moment later, I shift in the cramped metal space welded to the underside of the hyperloop. Wobbling on Demon''s hard shoulders, as I reach up to crack the trapdoor. Eyes scanning the endless procession of lights streaming off into the heart of infinity. "Crisp-packets followed us." I chuckle, eyes gleaming in the darkened gap. "C''mon." We flow from the tiny pod in a wave of guns and golden claws. Reaching down to hoist a slightly-flat Badger (clutching even flatter rat-thing). "We seriously letting him keep that?" Kami grumbles, in her kindest and most caring tone, as we spread to circle her. Zipper and me on the flanks, SMGs out. Demon prowling the edges, with Tufty in tow. With zero cover to be had, she''s our ace in these long, barren, tunnels. And she knows it. Nowhere to hide, so quickest shooter wins. Except she''s really low on ammo. I glance at the virtual ammo-counter floating above her back - and my implant fuzzes out. Cracking my vision into lines. Thankfully, the look still toggles open her [Loadout] in the corner of my eye.
LMG ''Thorn Of The Oppressor'' - Anti-Materials Rifle :: 8/8 Ammunition (loaded/carried) Guided Explosive :: 1/6 Explosive :: 3/5 Kinetic :: 4/8 Armour Piercing :: 0/0 AP Guided :: 0/0 Destroyer :: 0/0 EMP :: 0/0 Guided Kinetic :: 0/0 Incendiary :: 0/0 ''Thorn'' microNukes :: 0/0 Plasma :: 0/0
"Red light. What''s that?" Zipper says, forcing my eyes up. I jerk my chin out. "That''s our target. C''mon." We close distance, and stop - crouched on the dimpled plastic. Eyeing the sudden, sharp, split in the hyperloop track. A trail of crimson lights splitting, suddenly, from the main path. Forming a blind left turn, with no real corners to peer round. Dammit. "Polybius. Ya cracked their cameras yet? Their real cameras?" "No." It states, shards of static picking at my skull. "It may be hardwired." Kami lets off a curse. "Whatever it is, they probably got eyes-on our asses. At minimum, they felt that blast." I growl. "Zip - gimmie scouts. Kami - you''re up." "Shit. Here we go." She mutters as brassy eyes flick open on her suit. Kindling their halos of burning gold as she steps off to the side. Her entire body compacting as light bends around her. Vanishing her down to a dot. At the same moment, Zipper''s body erupts as dozens of tiny toy bees take off. Trailing a buzz of wings as they streak off down the tunnel, and vanish out of sight. Red lights whirling across grim faces we roll forward - fast as we can. Guns out, and ready. No surprises. We''re almost to the second vacuum-seal, right at the end of the tube, when something stirs up ahead. A double-thump of sound that stills the GMOs in the group, sending Kami''s shimmering mirage stumbling a few extra steps. "What?" She hisses over comms, irritation blazing. "Mate, like, uh, hold on....." Zip stutters as his bionic eyes flicker with light. Then they widen. "Shit! Hostiles! We got brutes, mate! Big bastards!" "Back! back!!" I roar at them, shoving off my pads into a running reverse. Tufty a green streak, herding Badger - ears flat, tail spiked. Zipper bounding elegantly off his toes as Kami stumbles on the heels of her boots. Demon huffing - borderline snarling. His fingers splayed like weapons, as we reverse. Which is right when the two huge shadows bloom against the edge of the tunnel. Vast, and twisted, and wrong. "Zip. What are they?" I breathe out in a low, urgent, tone. Eyes never ceasing. "Dunno, mate!" He yells as a huge, mutated, paw slams into the side of the tunnel. Wrinkly, slough-skinned, fingers ripping sharp lines across hardened plastic. Plastic that had weathered centuries unmarred. And then its left hand hits the other side of the tunnel. "Gone Wrong." I whisper, as the muscle-thick nightmare drags itself into view. Twinned heads mangled together into a single, truck-wide, body. Too many eyes, wet with pus, leering down at us with mindless intent. Raising all the hairs on my tail, as it shoves itself forward. Its own a thick, rubberised, cable bound together. Patchy armour covering its split-in-two chest - rimmed by weird tubes that pulse with unknowable chemistry. "Hi there, pretty boy." Kami sneers as her massive rifle cycles up with an ominous little ''pweee~''. "Yah! Wait! Maybe Boris can make friend-" Badger''s innocence is crushed as two throats roar in broken harmony - their voices the exact opposite of ''cute''. And then it shoulders down, and charges on all fives. An extra paw smacking the side of the tunnel, as me and Zipper dive clear. Tufty dragging the shrimp behind him - right as Kami''s aim centres, and she locks her stance. White-hot energy arcing between the rails as she eases back on the trigger. Her focus suddenly shot as Tufty reaches Badger, hauling him away from the fight. And I see the rifle shift, just a fraction, with her head. "Don''t you d-" The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. BOOM. The whole tunnel thunders with the shot. Flame and sparks blooming in a pillar around her, as the rocket snaps down the hallway. Piercing a little round hole in one of the monster''s shoulders, and blowing the entire back of it clear across the ceiling. Rocking the thing a step toward us, as it staggers. Blood of every colour but red spraying up half the wall. The kill-shot missed. "Oh. SHIT!" I scream, launching directly into a full on sprint toward the monster. Zip, and Demon, flanking to the right as Kami stares in horror at her gun. "No....." Kami''s eyes widen. She recovers, quickly. But ''quick'' is never quick enough in a fight, and the rat-champion is an avalanche on legs. Punching one massive fist into the wall, purely for freaking balance, as it launches a massive kick at Demon. Catching him clean in the chest. He flies. But I''m already blazing in from the side. My SMG hurling out a roar of bullets that rain tiny pinprick holes all over its body. Slapping its leg, and melded torso, on the way to the smaller skull. The monstrous rat-thing doesn''t even notice.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 180/220
Zip drops flat as the rat-champion tries to swat him aside, hitting only air. "Problems, mate!" "What??" I scream back. "Two-" He rolls away in a whipping blur of blue as the thing stomps. "-two more! Smaller!" "Oh. Hell." I groan. "What is this? A bloody convention?" I flick a slashing motion, and Demon nods as I snap my SMG to my armour. Dropping to all fours, as we curve along the sides of the tunnel - with Gremlin giggling madly after. I draw breath, and shove myself up the curve - in mirror to him. The world tipping around me as we gain speed and height, until I''m forced to leap or fall. Right before gravity makes traction irrelevant, I kick off in a massive bound. Diving for at the left-hand head, while Demon takes the right. The pair of us landing, in a flurry of claws, as Gremlin slams in beside us. Sinking tiny teeth directly into a huge, bulging, eye. With, really, just way too much enthusiasm. And the rat-champion somehow ignores her. Focusing, instead, on the two much bigger threats. Its fist swinging past me as I carve open a roaring artery. Smearing strange fluids across my visor as I grab its massive, ragged, ears and flip clear over one head. Landing between it and the other. But the claws come slashing down on me, and I''m forced to hop onto the head itself. Slashing ears as the melee boils around me. It''s just too much. Even with one arm down, the rat-thing is mayhem itself. And though we jink, and slash and curse we aren''t doing a damn bit of damage. "FIRING!" Kami screams, and we abandon the monster. Diving for cover behind it. Even at half-charge, Kami''s rifle lets off an echoing roar too huge and hideous to ever be called an explosion. Fire venting, wildly, as it slams a thick round down the length of the tunnel. Spirals of acid smoke trailing directly to the forehead of the right-hand head. Rocking it, suddenly, forward. Shockwaves whipping up hair and wires as the back of its head erupts into a spray of skull, and brain, and oddly coloured mist. And metal. And tubes. The thing staggers. One leg, and arm, slumping as the right-most head almost seems to deflate. But then, as if it''s not even slightly bothered, the other head drives it forward. Hauling it along, with mismatched limbs, as another two hulking rat-things claw their way into the ruby dark of the hyperloop. One sleek and lean. The other little more than a wire-filled torso, half bald and bloodied with mange. Instantly, they zero in on the weakest pair - and my blood chills worse than the [battleStim]. My eyes fixate on them. And then on Badger - petting a terrified, sobbing, Tufty. His green eye glazed, and twitching. Tail wrapped tight. Both hands clamped to his furry ears, as- Something brutally fast and wickedly sharp cuts the air by my face as I jerk backwards. Oily-dark claws of glossy black twisting to come at me again. Hammering me in a flurry of demented, staring, eyes and slick fur. Catching Gremlin, literally from the air, and hurling her hard into the side of the tunnel. Holy. Shit. Nobody catches Gremlin. Nobody. In panic, I block a falling strike - then slash blindly. Claws humming air. Catching a fleck of its wide, ratty, ear as Demon works to flank it. Lashing bladed fingers as he snarls and works himself into a froth of fury. But there''s no rat-tail of wires and tubes to grab and cut. Not this time. Kami is far too slow to help, and her gun''s on charge. She''ll hit the torso. Zipper is a blur of blue that comes crashing to a stop. Light stuttering, in the shape of a creature, as his head rocks suddenly back. As if punched by Kami at full stealth. He yells, and rolls. A blade in his hand, whiplash fast, but the thing hits him again. Again. Driving him toward Badger and Tuft. Kami snarls, and moves to help - hammered in the chest for her trouble. And, right in that moment, I realise we are in very deep shit. That I only have one option. One I can''t afford to go gentle on. Not anymore. "Hey!" I whisper-snarl across a stuttering private line, diving to cut off the blur of rat-man. "You think we took them bloody chains off so you could WATCH US DIE?" I choke back the sudden scream, forcing my voice as low as I can. "Do you?" "S-Spook-" "You bloody promised me!" I mouth, even as I want to shout it. Almost feeling a terrible thrill of panic go through the cat. "Come on! Now''s ya chance! Come on! You gonna prove me right, or The School?" "Spook! Please!" Tufty whispers. "I- I can''t!" "Can''t or won''t!?" I scream as a viper-headed tail snaps at my face. Ebony-dark claws peeling fine, curling, ribbons from my armour. Zipper blazing past, fighting nothing but air. Kami trailing and cursing, as the torso drags itself ever closer to our line. I barely realise I was distracted before the ratlike-blur hooks my leg, and hammers me down by the chest. Claws streaking right for my throat, as something savage and slathering follows. But a gold-clawed foot bites down, right by my face, and Demon''s horns slam it from above. Or try to. The rat-blur twisting again to plant feet on my chest. Fighting me, and Demon, at the same freaking time. "SPOOK!" Badger wails as I grab the rat''s foot and twist. Claws shredding free from my hands, as it spins away. Leaving them bloodied, and stinging. I snarl, and twist after it. Rolling up. One hand leaving a bloodied print as the other curls into a finger-strike that harms only air. Which is when the Goddamned insectile legs unfurl from its back. Stabbing at us both with blade-edged tips that force us to dive and pivot and roll. "Tufty! We need the bloody edge! We ain''t fast enough!" I scream back as Demon blasts furious breath from his nose. His claws a five-point blur of brass that clash with those of the whip-quick rat. His sheer momentum carrying around, into my bladed kick. Which it slithers around. And over. More fluid than creature. Slipping ever closer and closer to Badger as it ducks his [Berserker] charge. Together, we should be pinning it between us. In reality, it''s pinning all three of us. Forcing us to defend the weaker links, or see them ripped apart before us. Kami''s brawler fists swinging, almost drunkenly, at nothing as she plays her mad game of keep-away. Zipper twisting to stab it from both sides, with no idea where ''it'' is at all. And, all the while, the weird torso drags itself closer. Twenty seconds, and it''s gonna be one Hell of a problem. "Spook..... the monsters.... I can''t....." "It''s now or never." I whisper, almost sadly, as the heat of sweat burns down me. No room to disengage. No room to shoot. We got too focused on melee when we could''ve bloody blasted them. I thought- "But what if....." Says a very, very, small voice as Demon''s leg flashes an arc of mayhem past my face. Golden eyes fully wild. Fully berserk. The creatures pressing us. Herding us. "BETTER! BLOODY! DECIDE!!" I scream as the rat-blur cuffs my helmet with one hand, right as that snake-tail slams my leg. Janking my balance half-way to falling. "FIGHT OR RUN!!!! JUST PICK ONE!!!" The needle-legs come striking down. Demon''s arm slapping out, as Gremlin latches onto its face but gets ripped away before she can settle. "COME ON!" I roll away. "FIGHT OR RUN! YOU WON''T SAVE BADGER OR ANYONE JUST SITTING THERE!!!" And there is a sudden moment of stillness, so sharp it cuts my breath. An an echo of Tufty from the very instant The School lost all control over us. From the moment of our escape. From the heart of betrayal, when all things came undone. When Moon came cajoling, and Mother smiled at all her little games. And killing Tufty felt like a palpable inevitability. "I.... It''s not just the monsters.... out there..... I''m afraid of....." The sad, green, shape breathes into the terrified hush of that moment out of time. And then.... .....a hideous slash of searing red explodes across my visor. Something darkly green, smeared with bleeding-red light. My body, suddenly, not my own as I''m blown backward by the hammerblow speed of the attack. Barely visible, it''s moving so fast. "Oh, Hell." I whisper, to nobody, even as I fall. "He''s smiling." And that''s when the real violence begins. > > >< < < >> Interruption >> Interruption Six weeks ago..... An echo of Kami explodes through the wall of rain and smoke and shadow in the doorway. A memory. A shard of what was, and will never be again. Pacing the hollow worker''s shack, as we breach the storm behind her. Tinsheet walls hammering and shaking as if barely attached, weeping blackened waters onto rusted tools. Screwdrivers and drills, lost to the passage of time. Metal tables caging us into a narrow strip of roughened floor, inch deep with cool water. "You let it inside." She whispers, as if about to kill. Planting many hands on a machine-shop table, bent and rusted by time. "You....LET..... THAT.... THING INSIDE!!!" "His name. Is Tufty." I whisper, death lurking in the rumble of my words. "Not anymore." Her voice cracks with hoarse breath as long-gone lightening crashes across the barren rooftop. Flashing in the gaps of our rattling, rust-dripping, shelter. "Spook. You KNOW what they do to the ''Special Kids'' at that freaking ''School''. You. Know." "No I don''t, and neither do bloody you!!!! Nothin'' is real in that place!" I snarl at her heaving back, while the rain beats against my own. Slickening my brand-new armour. "You think I''m gonna trust a bloody rumour?? I don''t even trust my bloody eyes in that place!" "Oh god, you don''t understand....." She clutches herself, and shakes. Other hands fixed to the pitted counter. "Spook. It''s not a rumour. The real Tufty.... is dead..... He''s actually dead." I slam forward, almost grabbing her. "He ain''t DEAD, you bitch! He''s RIGHT FRIGGIN'' THERE!" "YOU DON''T UNDERSTAND!" She shrieks back. "Please listen! Please! I just want to protect you! Please! The THING in there is manipulating you-" "HIS NAME!" I scream back. "IS TUFTY!!!" "NO! THAT''S JUST HIS BODY!" She cries into the water, and The City weeps with her. "The body is Tufty, but the brain is GONE. They RIPPED IT OUT OF HIM!!" A choking gasp, as she turns her haunted eyes toward me. "Spook. They scraped out his skull. I saw it. They ripped his brain into mush, and stuck something else inside it......" "YOU''RE LYING!" I howl. "LISTEN TO ME!! That''s Tufty''s body, but it''s not Tufty inside it! Not anymore! It''s an AI personality core! It''s meant to trick you! But it''s a skinsuit! A hollowed out husk! It isn''t Tufty anymore!" I snarl and turn away. "No." "Spook! COME ON!" "HE AIN''T A BLOODY PUPPET!" I slam back at her, over the endless noise. My voice turning brittle and desperate as I add "No matter....." I steal a breath from the heart of terror. "no matter how much them bastards wanted him to be....." If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. The waters of the torn-open doorway ringing with dancing droplets in the sudden silence as Zipper splashes in beside me. Quiet, and quietly wrung out. His eyes flashing wide and reflective-blue in the stark light. Metallic, and shining, like a GMO. Two days without sleep. Two days on the run. "Do you even know how that sounds?" Kami''s voice is barely a whisper against the torrents smashing our shelter. Breaking it down, atom by atom. "Spook! Please! I''ve seen this again and again! They take them away, and they come back WRONG. Just like Freakshow. Just like that thing you let in the ship." "HIS BLOODY NAME IS TUFTY!!" I scream. "CAUSE THAT''S WHAT I NAMED HIM, WHEN-" "Please, Spook! Don''t fall for this! Not after everything he''s done! Everything we''ve seen." Her shoulders are sagging. Her head a lump of lead between her shoulders. "He''s....." Mine. My little brother. A precious link to my father. "Please.... Y''don''t gotta bloody do this t''me....." "I wish..... I wish I didn''t....." Her voice starting to crack. Her breath choking on grief, as her too-many shoulders shake. Guttering out a quiet little sob. "Oh, god. I really don''t. I don''t want to do this..... I...." "Then don''t." I falter. "No. I HAVE TO." Kami sobs, Broken, deeper than I''ve ever seen her. "Oh god. Spook. I loved him. I really loved him. He used to hug me, and tell me things. Stupid little baby things. It...." "Me too....." I whisper. "But..... that....." A jerk of pain slams through her. "That thing you brought with us-" "Don''t call him a ''THING''!" I roar out as the plates of the shed hammer with Typhoon''s fury. "Spook! Stop! Please stop! You''ve got to know by now!" She begs me, finally turning her rough-wrought face. The sockets of her skull so hollow, and dark, and full of pain. Her sunken eyes so red they''re almost bloodied. "That isn''t him. That isn''t Tufty. I''m sure of it. It''s his body. It''s his face. But there''s something else....." A low swallow. "Has he ever shown you.... what''s under that fringe?" "Stop..... Please..... Hes our friend" I choke on the trauma clamping my throat. Reaching out to Zipper for support. "Our lil baby b-b-b." I shut my eyes, and they go red with surging light as the metal roof slams against its bolts. "You still can''t say it..... even now." She stares at nothing. At the clashing metal. "It hurts. It hurts too much...." to call him my brother. "But even if he''s messed up...." I whisper, every word lost to the flashing dark. "Even if we''re all broken, we gotta try. For a long while, the storm is the only sound. The ripping wind. The rain, fierce as falling knives. Rushing in through gaps and holes to stir the inky water against bare skin. Lapping between toes, and up against ankles. Washing armour worn for days. The ghost of my sodden tail dredged behind my legs. My eyes fixated on the busted everLight above. The tools. The fallen shelves. And the droplets plinking from Zipper''s toes as he sits, in silence, on a busted metal-shop table. And, slowly, Kami''s eyes soften. Her face burning with shame and sympathy. Swallowing, quietly, as she stares out at the steaming hulk of The Night Tyrant - still waiting in the dark. To Tufty''s bound body, guarded only, by Demon and the internal guns - inside. Its shape shimmering in the downfall of the sky, as the remembered echo of the little barefoot black kid blurs madly about in the storm. Jumping, joyfully, through thick puddles as heavy walls of rain slam down upon him. Battering him this way and that as a doll-like thing with ginger hair sits, perfectly and sweetly, in the limited shelter of a Monolith engine. Smiling, very nicely, instead of rocking and crying. "I''m scared." Kami whispers as the old walls clang with speeding drops. Startling me back. "Spook, I''m scared. and I''m alone. And I''m a long way from home.... I don''t even know which way to go......" "You''re never....." I start. "You think I like admitting it?" Her voice rises, and then chokes once more. I step forward, into the dark shell of the old room. Templates plates shivering with every breath of the howling night. A night that will never, ever, end. "What now, mate?" Zipper whispers. >>><<< >> The Wreckage Of Fate >> The Wreckage Of Fate Silence, and darkness, and shattered bodies litter the hyperloop. Ruby lights blackened, and smoking, as hidden electrical panels drizzle sparks onto the bloodied ruins of the dead. Eviscerated, and steaming, upon the floor. The eerie slather of colourful fluids slowly draining down the sides of the tunnel. Pooling, quietly, around a boy whose hair was at one point green. Tufty is an absolute mess in the midst of utter carnage. His fur, hair, and skin slick with horrific gore. His claws digging, tight, into the severed head of a mangled rat-creature. Its face now slack, and glassy-eyed. Its blood pouring from between his fingers to drench..... everything.... as his tail lashes a slithering ''S'' through the gore. His shaking body rocking, gently, as mewls and sobs and shrill little giggles spill from his chest. "Mummy says I can be as Bad as I want, if I''m a Good Little Boy....." He whispers to it, madly. Almost lovingly. Ripping at the flesh of the torn-off head. His body contracting, until the forehead of the rat-man meets his own. "And Mummy Always Knows Best...... Mummy always-" "Tufty?" I whisper. And his whole body goes sharp and rigid. A thrill of terror. Of horror. "Tufty....?" The torn-off head slips from his hands, as he stares at them. Touching his face. "No.... No.... no...... nonono....." I stumble toward him, crouching on the rim of the bloody explosion. Meat and gore plastered all across the flickering, reddish, darkness of the tunnel. Kicking a scaly rat-leg that shimmers in and out of focus. Its surface threaded with wires and nodes. With tiny tubes that that ooze a strange, clear, fluid that isn''t quite water. Slowly the kid''s face jerks, and twitches, toward me. A leaking hand pressed tight to the left side. The other a wash of stained fringe, as if he has no eyes at all. Except for a single spark of terrified green, shining through the strands. I stare at it, as if across a mile of bloody ocean. Reaching out, as if to touch his face. But I can no more move than I can fly. My arm falling as Demon''s huge shadow rolls between us. His hand touching Tufty, as if expecting a vicious shock. But when none comes he scoops the boy into a tight, but bloody, hug. Clawed hands cupping the boy''s stained mop of malachite hair as he speaks soft reassurance, like a big brother should. The small cat nods, wearily, plastering his fringe down over the usual eye. And shivering. Shuddering. Sobbing, so gently, as Demon pets his head. "No....... It won''t..... I''m okay......" He breathes. But Demon lifts him free of the staining gore, and carries him away from me. Slowly, my hand falls. Something bitter in my throat, as dark ink burns the edges of memory. An echo of tinplate rattling on a faraway tower. The heavy thump of boots, on water.... or blood, behind me. The tink of metal arms. For a moment she stands there. And then she turns. Leaving me, alone, at the heart of desolation. Alone, as the others spiral around me. Zipper, coaxing a sore and unhappy Gremlin from under his cloak. Kami scanning bodies, and frowning, though her eyes never once leave Tufty. And Badger...... staring off into oblivion. His beaming face splattered with strange blood. "Hey?" I call, but he doesn''t move. "Badger?" I take a step, and he blinks. "Huh....? SPOOK!" "Right. You ok-" I start, but Kami jerks my arm. "SHIT! Spook! You need to look at this!" "Kami, hold-!" I yelp, but she yanks me hard toward the massive corpse of the multi-headed rat. "What is this?" "Mate!" Zip pops out from behind it, holding the severed pipes. "Shit, like, you seen this?" "What??" I jerk away from Kami, and snarl. "Look, mate!" Zipper yells over, jabbing a pair of fingers at the hulking corpse. "Look at them, mate!" "Look at...." I stare at the ruined hulk of the dead monster. The dead rat. Its body carved by crude cybernetics. With bolts and pins and chips spiked through its skull - all chips and wires and tech where a person should be. Images of the fight are burnt into my mind, like flash-frozen slices of mayhem. A slideshow of carnage, and bloody claws, and panic. Every instant perfect, and pristine, as a photo. Yet I never noticed the emblem tattooed into its neck. A logo shaped like a chaos of woven arrows - pointing in every direction. Circled by a chain of brassy words. "Holy shit......" I whisper, as chills go writhing up my back. "Property of Wayman Company....." And all the pieces begin to lock. Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings. Rats. Freaking rats. And people trying to kill us. I drop to my haunches, ripping through electrical guts, and wires. Looking for some clue, or sign or mistake. Because if Wayman are here. If they''re right here, right now..... What the Hell does this mean? And how did they find us? Kami pokes at the butchered brain with a viciously tooth-edged tactical knife. Its gloopy surface wormed full of wires and strange metal parasites. She sucks breath, and drops the bloodied tip. "Shit, Spook. They''re chip slaves. Fully mind-controlled. I think we did them a favour....." "Wayman.... can do that? They got the Tek for it??" I hiss. "Shit, it looks cobbled enough." Kami''s whole body shivers. "Are doing this to those people they sent at us.....? Those little kids.....?" Zipper blinks as her eyes flip to Gremlin, chewing furiously at one of his straps. Then Badger, sat alone and quiet and smiling. Then, finally, to Tufty. Her brow furrowing in thought. "Regardless. This is concerning." Polybius says through the speaker on my gun. "Wayman Company should not have this capability." "Nobody should." I snarl. Though I''m pretty sure that ain''t what Pol meant. T-theyre not going to do that to us, a-are they? Tufty whimpers, blinking shyly from behind Demon. We all stare at him, then look away. "I won''t let em." I state, with force. Dont even worry about it. He nods. O-okay then. Right. I beam back, gathering my wits. Now- A low wump shudders the floor. An almost imperceptible thrum through my skin. So soft that Kami, in her boots, doesn''t even notice. "What?" She blinks as we turn away from her. Staring deep into the red-shadowed darkness of the hyperloop''s distant trainyard. "Spook-" "Shhh....." I hiss as a merry tinkle of quiet laughter zings through the air. Unnatural, and garish, and far too joyful in the vast void of the tunnel. Echoes carrying it from nowhere and everywhere. Behind us, and in front. Like a fossil of a sound, echoing forever in the endless tunnels. Tufty''s eye begins to saucer. His body rigid as green ears flick and rotate. Failing to pin down the echo. Zipper behind him, cupping his own - human - ear. The floor thrums again, and a terrible realisation builds in my chest. "Run." I hiss "Spook, what are you-" Tiny pinprick lights flicker along the endless track, and all of us jerk and stumble into action. A slow, almost imaginary, wave of air billowing against skin. The first gentle breath of a thing, long forgotten, stirring from its eternal sleep. Dusting the fur on my tail, and ears. Coaxing up whispers of dust from the floor. "RUN!!" I scream as Demon pulls Tufty onto his back - with only a flicker of hesitation. Bits of my armour jerking and stuttering as as if caught in something magnetic. I turn tail, and hammer down onto all fours. Zipper grabbing an inert Badger as we break back the way we came at full speed. Already, I can feel it. The hyperloop train is a massive weight behind us. Slow, and heavy, and building in relentless and terrible power. A massive plunger, shoving air down the tunnel toward us. In solid vacuum it''s true top speed would be thousands of miles an hour. Out here? It''s harder to say. But I know for a Goddamned fact it won''t need thousands to mash us. About forty would do. But what bursts from the end of the tunnel is no train. Instead, as if by magic, a million glowing-bright butterflies erupt into a roaring swarm that blazes past us. A billion rainbow wings that spark and streak and flood my vision. Whirling around me. So many their wings hum a wobbling note I''ve never heard before. Stumbling us with their chaos of green, and red, and shining blue. Purple, and orange, and every other colour. "IT''S A TRICK!" I roar as we explode down the hyperloop. "THEY''RE HIDING THE TRAIN!! IT''S COMING!!" And terror digs its metal claws right into my spine. We''re stuck in a tube. Weve got nowhere to go. My heart banging with a fury. My body shoved along by the pressure and force of displaced air builds into a roar behind me. "SPOOK! I CAN''T-" Kami screams from behind me. My vision scratchy. My robotic eyes fuzzing as the magnets build their charge. Most of our kit is plastic, or titanium, but every steel screw is suddenly yanking me down. Colours and errors flashing across my visions as emergency lights begin to flash. The thrum of the butterflies isn''t their wings. It''s an engine. An engine of awful power, from a time before all reckoning. Churning and rumbling. Building with fury as it hammers toward us, out of the tunnel. Ahead of us, a vacuum seal begins to shimmer. Lights flickering as the ancient track comes fully alive. My mind racing through possibilities at a lightening speed. Would it stop the train? No. We''re meant to think it will. Will it stop us? Hell yes. I put hands and toes to the plastic, and blur with speed. Outpacing Zipper''s streak of blue, as I aim directly for the service-hatch. Kami, far behind - cursing us all for abandoning her. But we aren''t. We''re clearing the way. Or that''s what I tell myself as me and Zipper leap clear through the airShield. Right as it snaps taught and shut. Fumbling for a frag I don''t have, as I run for the control hatch. Kami and Demon slamming into the electric wall - locked into a bubble of raging butterflies, with jolts of power sparking off hammering fists. A little dark thought whispering no more Kami, no more proble- "QUICK! BLOW THE BLOODY HATCH OR-!" I scream, to drown it. "REALLY!??!" Badger trills with sparkly eyes, and all the blood in me turns cold. "NO! WAIT-!" I start, but the boy is already in motion. His real hand a blur as he tosses a chunky little pipe-bomb directly, into the hole. Detonating it with a fang-rattling WAM that pulps everything inside. Every lights dies. The airShield fluttering. Failing. It bursts as Demon''s fist punches directly though it. Hauling Kami towards him as golden butterflies thunder around them in fountaining waves. Tiny wings screaming as we turn and race our death around the swooping curve of the hyperloop junction - riding the tsunami, all the way to the join. And trying, very hard, to ignore the hidious noise of it crushing the corpses into a smear. The sweat already thick on my scalp from the fight before. My body aching for rest I can''t afford to give it. But I see the break in the passage. The wall vanishing to my left as our tunnel pulls a hocky-stick to merge with the main hyperloop track. And this the moment of truth - I can feel it. What they want if for us to panic. To not think. To follow the track, like good little idiots, and get ground into fine paste like the corpses behind us. Actual, literal, paste. We take that straight, and it''ll roll hup behind us. Gather speed. And we''ll be smeared across five miles of tunnel. So there''s only one option, and I take it as hard as I can. Grabbing Demon''s arm as I kick myself, sideways, over the divider-line. Rolling, with him, onto the main hyperloop track - right before the two routes merge. Zip grabs Kami''s arm, and something soars above them. Trailing a strap. Badger''s satchel. It tumble through the air behind us, as if caught on a butterfly wing. Spinning. Turning. Surrounded by colour. And then it''s gone in a blurring, blaring, rush as a bajillion tons of hyperloop train skewers past us like a serpentine missile. Jerking and skinning the walls as the track''s control-systems fail. Smashing a massive dent as blaring ionic engines carve around the corner. Trailed by an endless river of more and more train. Until it happens. A sudden, shaking, BOOM that rattles through the ground. There''s a movement of uncertainty as relentless engine barely shakes. As if shrugging off the terrible, but distant, blast ripping the nose off the engine. But then it gets worse. The snaking carriages slamming from side to side. The motion building into a crashing, flexing, writhing of metal - as if the train had somehow gained a mind of it own. A mind wracked with pain, and hate, and terror. With mayhem that rattles the bones in our skin. And then The Grand Quebec Express takes an unscheduled detour through the wall of the junction. Ripping the hyperloop apart. >>><<< >> End Of The Line >> End Of The Line Cataclysmic thunder slams us against the floor of the hyperloop as the ancient structure shakes on its foundations. Miles upon miles of suspended tunnel vibrating, flexing, and shattering from within. Exploded open by the force of the vast machine violently coiling and compacting inside it like a living thing. Every impact snatches our legs, and hurls us wildly against the floor and sides of the tunnel. Blurring the world into a tumbling mess of faces, limbs, and hyperloop track - all of which smashes me, repeatedly, in the face. Knocking us, bit by bit, towards that screaming wall of metal and plastic and flames. It''s the kind of thing you cannot fight, or escape - only survive, and endure. So I pull my arms in, and force my body to relax. Timing kicks that send me barrelling, backwards, into the others. Knocking Zipper and Demon and Badger further from the broiling brink of annihilation as the bend itself is torn apart and broken open. Hurling struts and sections of tunnel into the stormy dark beyond. An eternal instant later, the tearing engine begins to slow. Ionic engines reversing, and then shutting off, as the train crashes to an unseemly halt. Slamming carriages into the floor as the whole thing, slowly and surely, grinds to a halt. Becoming just another wreck in the wilderness. Belching smoke and bits of train. For a blessed moment, there is silence. And then there is Badger. "OH MY GOD, BUT THAT WAS THAT WAS TOTALLY AMAZEBALLS!!!" He cheers, hopping and skipping and dodging chunks of ceiling. "NO!! IT WAS BETTER! IT WAS ULTRA MEGA EPIC! NO! IT WAS-" He takes a massive, epic, shuddering breath. BRUTAL!!!! "Yay." Kami says, flatly. I need a stiff drink and a lie-down. "But you''re already-" He goes ''yeerp!'' as she grabs an ankle, flipping him onto his face. "Y''know this is why you''re on all them bloody watchlists? Right?" I grumble as the lil terror pops instantly upright, doing a happy lil chugga-chugga choo-choo victory dance around us. And over us. Jumping our groaning bodies, and pumping that oversized robotic fist in the air. "Hey, like, least it ain''t the worst train wreck he''s caused. Right?" Zip says as an entire carriage snaps off the train, crashing off towers and outcrops all the way down. "I guess he didn''t hit any massive bloody gas tankers this time." "WOO!! BEST SHOT EVAAAR!!!" "Or, like, another train." Zip adds. "SECOND BEST SHOT EVAAAR!!!" I shake my head. "God dang. How many is that now??" "Uh, like....." Zipper starts counting fingers. "Does, like, that pirate truck-on-rails thing count?" "Yes. Yes it does." I gripe as Badger giggles helplessly. Or, possibly, maniacally. "How does he even bloody do it? It''s a bloody train! It''s massive! But he knocked it over with a lil bag of- of whatever!" "I dunno, mate. He''s, like, an idiot-savant for bowing stuff up?" "Idiot is bloody right. He got the lowest bloody test score in the history of-" A metal hand slaps down on my helmet, rotating it up and toward Kami''s face. "...uh oh...." "YOU BLOODY LEFT ME BEHIND!" She explains very calmly and gently. Lifting me by the ear to give me a little shake. "I''M GOING TO RIP OFF YOUR DUMB TAIL AND CHOKE YOU WITH IT!!" "OW! OW! SHIT! Can ya sort this after the mission??" I yelp, fending her off. "It ain''t like we could''ve carried ya!" "YOU COULD HAVE HELPED!" Her jaw grinds left, then right. "No. Never mind. You''d only have made it bloody worse." I blink. "Uh.... Glad I could help, then?" "You- You should be!" She concludes, in a rational sort of way. Stalking off in search of her other boot. "Jeeze." I growl, furiously rubbing my poor ear. "Least one o'' us is in a good mood....." "Right, mate! Yeah!" Zip grins, catching a still-dancing Badger. "But, like, what now, though? Tunnels kinda blocked, right? We going through the train?" I flick a look up at the silvery, windowless, monstrosity rupturing its way through the bend in the track. Its mangled engines pumping deadly black smoke as rain blurs down through huge holes smashed in the walls of the tunnel. Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Walls cracked open, like an old skull, to reveal the world of tumbling blackness beyond. I shudder as the train slips a little more. Reminding me, a little too forcefully, that we''re stuck in a thin plastic tube suspended over a terrible drop. With new, and massive, cracks splitting the floor. I give the wide open tunnel behind me a longing look. An escapeway streaking off into infinite distance, broken only by moderate to massive holes - no doubt caused by pirates using it for target practice. Where does it go? I have no idea. Nowhere I know. "C''mon." I growl. Forcing bravado into the word as I step up. Clouds of inky-black smoke boiling around me as we attach magnetic breathers, and run toward the train. Heart skipping as I tear my eyes away from the ripped-open walls to focus on hopping across the fallen scrap. Our part of the structure only holding because the train didn''t hit the junction head-on. Zip grins, firing a line into the ruined ceiling mid-leap. It catches - and both feet swing to land, smack, against the polished side of the smoking train. The blue-haired boy cocking me a salute as he half-reels half-walks his way up to yank a little red emergency lever. I step back as the pressure-seals blow, and a mechanical hatch unfurls. Inner doors unlocking and splaying like leaves as a bright yellow emergency slide unfurls and inflates. A dozen lights flashing as the final layers slip open with a tiny puff of sterile air. I pull a massive leap, and fire my rappel. Landing, crouched over my toes, on the ledge as electric bees boil around me. Zipper swinging in as I side-roll, hard, across the dim-yet-inviting luxury of the first class carriage to impact with one hand on the opposite wall as Demon lands behind me. Claws sink deep into royal blue carpets, etched with golden leaves that glimmer softly in the low yellow light. A gentle flicker of antique brass lamps wedded to faux wood panelling. The strange calm offset by the eerie, Dutch-angled, tilt of the hallway. And there. Drifting like smoke through the dim, radiant, flicker of the lamps - I hear it. The softest murmur of classical music. A whisper so gentle a human ear would barely perceive it. Unfaltering, after even a hundred years or more. "No dust or nothin''." I note as Demon leaps up with Tufty and Gremlin on his back. Kami thundering awkwardly, with a little cackling dumbass hooked up under one arm. Still clutching his horrid, many-legged, rat - its face the very picture of ''I guess this is my life now''. I stand, carefully. Weighing my balance against the unsteady tilt of the deck as the carriage tips ever-so-gently toward that vast, black, hungry holes in the tunnel wall. Firing my beating heart with the wild song of panicked adrenaline. With images of the entire junction failing, crumbling, and dropping me into- No. I cannot. I will not run. I will not give in to the fear. The falling dream..... The others are depending on me. I''ve got to step up. I''ve got to. "Mate....." I clench my teeth, and shudder. Standing, tall. "C''mon. We''re going in." I step forward, then turn. "Watch y''selves. This entire bloody train is a choke-point. So, get ready - they''ll hit us again." "Oooh! Maybe I can-" Badger starts, but Kami shakes a lil idiot. "You''ve done enough." I whisper. Flicking a finger at Kami, who tosses him into the luggage racks. "Shorties to the rear. Demon-" "I''ll see to them." Kami says in a tone of calculated boredom. Three of her hands descending on Tufty''s head and shoulder. Sending a thrill through the small cat''s body. I hesitate. "Guard our rear." I tick my head toward Tufty, eyes sharp. "No casualties." Her lip twitches. "Sure." I nod. "Gremlin. Ya wanna do a little scouting?" Her little eyes wibble at me from under Demon''s cloak. One paw held stiff, like it''s hurting. "Uh. Maybe not then." I snort. "C''mon. Let''s roll." I take point and we push forward, between rows of empty luggage racks. Bursting in through an ornate sliding door, into a world from a forgotten age. Cosy tables of pretend-oak line a stream of that deep blue carpet. All lit by frosted lamps that flicker with fake flame, as endless oil-painted hills roll steadily by on either side. All sun-dappled colours, and things from a dream. Illusory butterflies linger with Zip''s bees, fluttering about over empty seats. The air alive with artificial scents. Old leather. Old brass. Old polish. I shiver a breath, and step forward. Eyes eager for danger. Ears swirling this way and that. "Spread out." I whisper. Slapping a hand to a left-side table to shoulder-roll atop it. Demon pouncing on the right, as Zipper casually struts up between us. Cocky, casual, and ready to rock. His smirk lazy. His SMG loose in one hand. The stance of a guy with whiplash reactions. "Careful." I hiss, and take another step. Feeling the trap, even before it springs. I hop forward a table, eyes sharp. Tail lashing as- "There! Turret!" I roar as a gleaming brassy orb drops from the ceiling, ejecting a cloud of flat metal cogs that blitz themselves into a whirl around it. Orbiting the machine at terrifying speeds. "What is it......" I snap my head to one side as a disc slams through the exact space where it was. Coming to a sudden, violent, buzzing, stop in midair. Humming like an industrial saw. Hoooo boy. I launch in as Demon blurs in on the other side. Bladed discs sparking off [Berserker] armour as he kicks from wall to table to wall, leaping right at the turret. Which dodges. "Shit! It''s a drone!" I yell, as the thing skids my way. Hitting it with roaring [burst]s of ammo as it flicks and darts from side to side. Snapping out disc after disc to cut us down as Zipper comes streaking up the middle. Eyes gleaming as his gun slaps upward, hurling out burst after burst. Fast as [Full Auto]. The done snaps back to Demon''s side. Hurling a skimming, singing, ring of death that skims toward Demon. - forcing him down as it streaks overhead. Arcing towards Zipper, like some terrible guillotine that forces him to twist and leap onto my side of the tables. I curse, and start running down the row. Leaping and bounding, on all fours, from table to table as bladed rings shriek past my face. Jolting to a stop right before they hit the walls, the fabric, or anything around us- "It won''t hit the train! Use it as cover!" I shout as two interlocked blades come spitting at my face. Forcing me down, into the seats, as they go wheeling and slashing overhead. But I don''t stop. I can''t stop. I feel the air snatch at my tail as I leap over the back of the seats. Feeling the whir of the blade that arced right around the corner - slamming to a stop, right where I was. And in that instant of distraction, as I half turn to look, I almost loose a hand to the pair of blades carving in from each side. Snipping shut like sheers, so close they sting the skin of my fingers. And that''s when the second drone drops. Dozens, upon dozens, of gear-toothed blades building into a storm that roars toward us. Screaming their pent up thirst for our blood. >>><<< >> Simulacrum >> Simulacrum A raging storm of metal hurls itself at us. A tsunami of golden rings shining with evil little teeth. Slicing past faces. Gashing armour, and skin, as my gun roars back - thundering out shot after shot. Guardian Orbs flickering as they dodge. "FORWARD! FORWARD!!" I scream, leaping from table to table. Side to side. Twisting in mid-air to avoid the hail of screaming razors, as I bring my gun to bear. Blasting out roaring torrents of fire and bullets.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 164/220
Zipper darts up beside me in a cheerful blur of violence. Leaping over my head like a cat to shoot freaking discs from the air. Burying a golden gear in the wall by my chin, with smoke and sparks bleeding from the hole in its internals. Demon kicking off a wall, to hit them from the sides. Fangs clashing down on a gear, with a snarl, as he rips it from the air and breaks it with sheer maniac force. His hands and lips dark with bloody red. His eyes alight with something feral, broken, and insane. Kami''s eyes flashing worry from the door behind him. Her rifle hunting a clear shot that won''t come- Stinging pain tugs my right ear, and I hiss in fury. Cursing the insult, and my distraction, as I hurl myself from table to table. In theory, we drive orbs into the wall and break them against it. In practice, they might do it to us - we''re losing as much ground as we gain. But I got a plan. "Get down! I''ll end it!!" "Mate! Like, I got a grenade!" "Save it!" I scream. "Swarm Mode!" Plates jerk back from my SMG as internal systems reconfigure. Micro-scale robotic clamps unfolding to rip bullet after bullet from my mag. Stacking them along the entire length of each barrel. Filling them totally. My muzzle sweeping up, right as the others back off. Aimed directly between the two orbs. "Hey! Assholes! Dodge thi-!" I ratchet back on the trigger, and the whole world goes red with flame as forty bullets ignite at the same time. Triggered, simultaneously, by a snap of spark along the rails of my gun. Burning my hand, scouring the wall, and blasting heat in every direction. It hits the drones as a massive, scattershot, wave of rockets. Bursting through the shielding torrent of discs to utterly perforate one of the drones. Scarring its perfect exterior, and knocking it back in the air. Slowly, fitfully, it jerks to a stop. And then Demon hits it like a train. Smashing it, bodily, into the wall. Snarling. Snapping. Ripping. Biting. Swinging it to hurl at the other drone, which dodges at speed. Barely catching a ding across the side. But it''s enough. Finally, enough. I dive through the suddenly drifting cloud of cogs. Firing off quad-shots as I go. One. Two. Three. It ducks into cover, in the seats. Hit by crossfire from Zipper. Too late. I skid along side, take careful aim, and [burst] fire dead centre on the orb. Weakening its armour for the sudden leap that follows. A thousand bladed disks screaming in for the kill as the butt of my gun cracks directly through its internals. Forcing me to roll over the table as they hammer into the corpse. Everything goes silent and still. Cogs slowing in mid-air. Whizzing to a stop. A moment later they tumble, one by one, to tinkle on tables and carpet. Silence, and I collapse back against the table. Gun leaking rocket-smoke and fits of flame as jammed bullets cook off in two of the tubes. Fizzing. Sputtering. Dying by moments as I stare up at the ornate ceiling. Slipping off my breather for a choking gasp of sterile air and raw smoke. "Damn, mate...." Zip says, ripping a cog free of his battered suit. "Like, shit, that was intense. My armour is toast." "Mine too." I growl, pushing claws into a massive rip carved through layers of plastic and ballistic foam. "This is it. We''re through. If we don''t make bank on this mission....." I trail off as Kami slugs her way into the carriage, scrunching her face to hide the worry. "You got the bastards?" "Looks like." I grin. "Rrggh. Couldn''t get a clear shot with your fat ass in the way." She gripes, glaring about. Which, in Kami-speak, means ''I was really worried and wanted to help.'' "Heh. I love ya too." "Shut up." "No, you shut-" "MATE!" Zipper yelps, from further down the row. "Mate! Got company! Humans!" I slam out a hand, shoving myself upright. "Where??" "Two along, left. Three along, right." Kami snaps out, staring at a screen. "Like, just lying there." Zip breathes back. "Go." I hiss, and we flicker down the line. Guns swinging to focus on a pallid man with slicked black hair and a tiny moustache. His head pressed gently against the surface of a table. Open eyes staring at nothing. "Got the other one, mate." Zip hisses. "Some kinda maid, looks like?" "Dead?" I frown. "Pretty bloody well preserved if they are." "They''re breathing." Kami counters. "Old clothes. It''s creepy as shit." "Just lying there....." I mutter, tapping the tip of my knife on his white silk glove. "Like they''re waiting? Or.... gave up?" "Nobody else, mate. Rest is empty." Zip says as his bees probe the oddly still ''people''. "Reckon they''re droids? Maybe?" "Maybe." I growl as Kami''s scanner flickers, and she lets out a low huff. "Androids. Tethered to the train..... I think." "Zip." I say, slowly. "Get Polybius in here." "Right mate! Signal Relay out the door, mate!" He chirps, blasting past me to toss a plastic ball at the wall outside. There, it blooms into a dish and orientates itself toward the one on our tower. A few seconds later, my gun crackles. The ammo-counter glitching. "Uplink Established." "Good." I grin, tugging back the collar and rubber skin of the bot to reveal plastic and wires. "Hey, Zip. Got a present for ya. Can ya handle two humanoids-?" I yelp as he materialises beside me. "Mate! Oh wow! Like! Yeah!! I mean-!!" He vibrates with the furiosity of a fully caffeinated Badger. "Heh. Yeah. Uh, just-" He barges past, fingers rattling as he hooks a cable from his skull to the bot to give The Machine Mind a way in. "Man! Like, I''ve always wanted to try this! Like they say it''s not possible to do two humanoids, but like-" "Yah don''t say." I grin, "Yeah and-" His head jerks back, bionic eyes flickering with lights as the walls start to glitch. Symbols and odd shapes flicker in the windows of the train as its painted blue skies turn a blasphemous green. Imperceptible figures twitching on blackened hilltops, like some macabre- The image clears, and both bots snap solidly upright. Poker straight. Their heads turning, very slowly, to face directly forward. "This is quite spiffing." The man says in a jovial, old-fashioned, voice. "I do declare." The maid chimes. "Directing two at once is quite the lark." "Uh huh." I smirk as Gremlin hops up on one of the seats, tilting her lil head to the left. "Tasty~sss?" It tips the other way. "Scaryssss?" She beams, evilly. "Tastyssss scarrysssst!!" "Don''t ya dare." I growl, though my lip flickers a smirk as Zipper shakes himself out of dreamworld. "You got it, drone boi?" "Yeah mate. Think so." He wanders into a table. "Basically." Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. "Right, well. Have fun. Don''t break em." I slap my side-arm onto the table, along with my ammo. "Could sell em later." "Mate! But....." His lip trembles. Eyes huge. "Like, c''mon....! I just got them....!" "I have detected multiple other droids onboard." My gun states in that cold, staticky, voice. "What action do you prefer?" I tap my teeth with a claw. "Can''t arm em all. Can''t walk em home." "Can''t walk ourselves home, either." Kami sniffs. "I could!" Badger whoops, popping from under a table. "Coz I got super powers!! Coz I got bitten by-!" "We''ll figure it out we''re done." I interrupt, resisting the urge to bop a bobblehead. "Polybius! Do we have eyes on the rest of the train?" "All systems are now under our control." I nod. "Good. Shut off the engines. Hand Zipper whatever bots ya can. Grab the rest, n'' get em workin'' to strip out any tek we can sell. Nothin'' too bulky. Might have a job gettin'' back in the Pirate Towers as is." "I am not equipped for drone operation." My gun informs me as I hop on a table to let them past. "However. I will preform this task to full capability." "Awesome...." I wince as Zipper mentally jerks the ''human man'' around in its seat like a shopfront dummy from ''Revenge Of The Living Dolls''. Puppet-hands flapping at the gun like its never had fingers before. "Yeah. Uh..... Try not to make it super creepy, alright?" "I will endeavour." "Got it, mate." "Hope so! Let''s move out!" I jerk my head at Zip. "Get ya''self ahead. Catch the bots up when ya can." "Brutal, mate! Will do!" He flicks me a beaming thumbs-up as he takes lead. Kami stomping and grunting in behind - dragging Badger, as she brings up the rear. As she passes, a metal hand snakes out. Grabbing my pointy ear, and dragging it in close. "H-hey-" "The train shifted, and it scared you." She states, very calm. "You thought it would fall. Drag us all into the abyss." Her breath is sharp, and oddly tangy. "Urk!!!?" I reasonably reply. "You were going to panic. Charge ahead, into the unknown. Or bolt backwards. Weren''t you?" "Urrk?" "But you didn''t. You stayed firm. You were the leader." She tweaks my ear again. "Good job." And, with that, she clomps off down the isle - Badger waving at me from under one arm. I rub my ear, staring after her. "....thanks?" Zipper''s androids totter slowly upright as I blink. Slow, but increasingly steady, as they stumble after - like a zombified rear guard. The man checking his mag while the maid tries to work out skirts and high heels - quickly opting to rip them off. I coil, uncertainly, on my table as they stumble past. Jerking, twitching. Finding their balance, even as they move. "Polybius. Just a bloody thought." I say in a very slow voice. "Human bodies are complicated. Right?" I turn to the fathomless machine "In bloody theory, how many d''ya think a plain vanilla human could handle at once? With no extra AI?" "The current world record is one." "Yeah." I say in an even fainter voice, as the robots jump about and try to fist-bump - barely missing by microns. "That''s kinda what I figured." "He may be synthetic. A false human." Whispers the maddening thing of triangles and wings pressing itself against the fake window. Its depths far deeper than the image behind it. "The military-grade equivalent of Theo." That puts the cold spike through me. "We grew up together." "Irrelevant." "He doesn''t seem-" "Irrelevant." It repeats. "He-" I start. But The Machine Mind is relentless, and spares none of my feelings. "Process of elimination indicates three possibilities. One: he is not human. Two: he has external help. Three: he is aided by unknown and undetected implants." "External." I mutter, latching onto the word. Dread filling me as I lick my dry lips. "And..... lets say a nine-year-old is knockin'' bloody trains off their tracks with precision bombs.....?" The machine is silent for a moment. And then images and 3D models of the event flicker in the windows along the carriage. The data extracted and calculated from onboard sensors, then broken down in forensic detail. I see the wreck play out again, far more clearly this time. Every angle accounted for. Every pathway tracked by tiny arrows, and numbers that indicate speed and angle. Except, this time, the bomb doesn''t go off. Sections of track darken, one by one, ahead of the train. Receding toward the junction as whatever powers them begins to fail. The front of the train drops like a rock. Ploughing to a sudden stop that flicks the back of the train like a whip. Sheer, unholy, momentum causing the entire rear of the train so swing into the turn. Scything a cluttered mess of carriages directly through the side of the junction, and out the other side. Pulverising us and hurling us out into the night. "Attempts to warn you were unsuccessful in the chaos." Polybius notes, as I shut my eyes. Chills shaking me. "However. Badger intervened." The train repeats its crash. But, this time, the strap of that tiny satchel catches its rightmost headlight. Pinning it there, with speed and pressure, as the massive engine stabilises on the straight. For a second the bomb flutters on its strap. Whipping. Rattling. And then - as if by accident - it slips into the deadly gap between the engine and the wall. Rupturing in a massive ball of flame, which fills the gap and instantly detonates a second time. "Explosive categorisation: PX-90. Airburst incendiary." Polybius states as the entire, main, engine of the train rips through the left hand wall of the junction. The one right by our freaking faces. "Manufacturer: neoSoviet Empire. Details: Fast burning material emits a flammable gas, causing high-pressure secondary detonations." "Badger''s favourite." I whisper as the train carves itself a brand new tunnel into the storm-haunted nothingness of the QIZ. And, this time, there is no sudden stop. No whiplash. Instead, the force of the train is twisted away from us. Carriage after carriage ploughing through the inner wall of the curve, instead of the outer. Connections exploding as carriage after carriage spews itself into the void. High-energy breaks screaming. Ripping at nodes on the track as they bring it all to a stop. Preventing the monstrous thing from lashing out anyway. From shotgunning carriages through even more of the junction. "Badger timed and placed both explosions with surgical precision." Polybius concludes. "Wait. Both?" "Correct. The first bomb disrupted power to the repulser track." The monstrous thing snicks its new wings like clockwork knives. "Badger predicted the crash in real time. Nudging it away from you at exactly the right moment." "Saved us...... The little idiot saved us....." I whisper. "Jesus..... What are the odds that weren''t a fluke?" Mile-high gears tick to themselves in the echoing depths of Polybius. Ratcheting teeth of iron and bone to drive systems and functions beyond anything I can know. Before, the sound was unsteady. Uncertain. But now the systems mesh with a perfection of purpose I''ve never seen before. An endless harmony, and clarity, that rings with unstoppable force. Like a clock counting down to the end of the universe. And maybe I don''t want to know why it seems bigger than it was.... "Polybius." I say in an ever more quiet voice, when I know it isn''t going to answer. Not because it doesn''t know.... but because I do. "What if Tufty''s the bloody decoy. What if Zip and Badger are the ones who got replaced?" My eyes slip out across its endless, snapping, knives and blades and wings. "What if I ain''t real, either? Would I even know?" I swallow. "Or I''m the only real one?" Tears tick on the inside of my visor. "....or none of us are. Maybe we''re all clones. Fakes. Would we even know?" There is no comfort in Polybius. None at all. There is nothing. Nothing but the tick of eternity as threads of metal crack and infect an idyllic, painted, village on a hill. I shake my doubts away. "Shit. It don''t matter. Not now...... I just gotta enjoy what I got, while I got it." I force a grim smile onto my face. "C''mon. Let''s go. I''m playing ''lone bloody idiot who gets picked off first'', and this ain''t that kinda movie...." Soft carpet whirls beneath me as I blur through tilted carriages on all fours. Dodging fallen blades, and broken bots, to slip through the scarred and broken exit. Brassy orbs glimmering above the tables inside. Four of them, this time. Whirling with blades, and ringed with flickering blue. I blink, and shake off the chills. Hunting through carriages, filled with more and more shining drones. With androids arm-wrestling, and defender orbs trading blade for blade. Following the curve of the tunnel, all the way to the end. I catch the others, right at the last door. The two androids locked in a blurring game of rock-paper-scissors that Badger lags five moves behind. His furious focus broken as Gremlin pounces on the battling hands, chewing furiously. "Pol thinks this is it." Kami says, easing it open for Zipper''s swarming bees. Our [Drone Tek]''s eyes blank and empty. Darting with dreamy little lights, yet still somehow fixed on his brand-new toys. "So he does have bloody limits." I stare at the few drones that don''t shine blue. "I''m gonna get to the bottom of this....." And find out why he gets all the cool stuff. Because bloody- My vision scours with static. With glitches and mayhem. And for a second, Zipper looks like a corpse. Like a body on a string. His eyes, and there are so many, sharp and blue as they snap to stare at me. Burning into my heart. And then it''s gone. Leaving only a shiver. "What....." I breathe. "What the Hell was that...." The world fuzzes again, then sharpens. Fogging with vertical bars that crack and fight the horizontal. Tufty blinks up at me. "Gosh, are-?" "Fine. Fine. We just gotta get bloody movin''." I blink through it, slapping my implant. "C''mon. We''re givin'' them bastards time to hit us again." I clear the jams in my gun as Zipper''s orbs bust through into the next carriage. Demon leading the boy behind, like a lost toddler, as we move in and check our angles. More drones. More identical maids and waiters lying, face down, at the tables. Unmoved, even by the crash. But as we pass, they jerk and rise. An endless army for Zipper and Polybius. "Spook. You have reached-" "I know. Let''s crack a way out." I flick a claw to the left, and Kami shoves a trolley filled with crumbling biscuits and muffins to one side. A quick metal elbow through safety-glass, and she yanks the emergency release. All of us diving for cover as the wall unfurls in a rush of billowing smoke and sparking flame. The fire is spreading. Flickering with eerie colour. Its light projecting metal shapes that loom and dance in the void beyond the door. Giving shadowy life to gantries and pillars. To engines on dollies. And massive fabrication-drones, caked deeply in dust. And yet, for an moment, all is still. But only a moment. Sudden as death, a wall of solid steel bullets roar through the doorway. Murdering the trolley in a rain of puffing packets and dust. Tracking across the wall to rip apart fake wood and veneer, while we shrink back from the chaos. Zipper''s bees painting us with reddish dark and roiling shadow as every false window of the train shift to show us what they see. "Sir Boris!" Badger yelps, as his new pet wriggles free of his arms. Bolting back up the train in a wild, many-legged, scramble for safety. "Leave it! We''ll get it on the way out!" I yell, fervently hoping we don''t. Brassy drones screeching in unison as heavy gauss rounds track across the cabin at body-height. Hammering the tables to shattered bits, and cleaving waiter-bots in half. "Frightful business." Remarks a broken head. "Quite." Concludes another. "Mate! Like, I just g-got these!" Zip slurs, patting at his armour like he might be missing a limb. "JUST KILL IT! KILL THE GUN!!" I roar back as mayhem and metal scars the cabin again. Carving holes directly through the bulkhead itself, as if they designed it to kill their own trains. I choke as foul, rubbery, smoke floods the cabin - forcing me back into my breather. "Got a sealed viewing deck up top. Thick glass." Kami traces its outline on a haze of glitches that should be a vScreen. Her face distorting into madness as our augmented reality begins to fail. Revealing scraps of blank helmet beneath the illusion of face. Half of the train''s fake windows are dead, and shot through. But I focus on the few that remain as Zipper''s swarm buzzes high above the train-yard. Massive loading arms hanging on car-thick rails that lead to a vast loading door. A thing wide enough to spit out trains. I crick my neck as the guns hammer us again and again. Two bulky turrets, sat right above the door. Magnetic nodes humming as they propel chunks of metal directly at my face. No sound. Not even a Goddamned flash of rocket ignition. I hate kinetic guns. My knuckles crick, one by one, as I eye the shadow-soaked cabin. "Y''know what?" I whisper, in a deathly tone. "I''m done bein'' bloody polite...." >>><<< >> A Doorway to Deaths Domain >> A Doorway to Death''s Domain Magnetic slugs roar like the rains of Hell as our suicide bombers drop from the the train. Their heads forced low as Zipper''s new drones crash into the massed forces of the train-yard. Thousands of cogs blasting in every direction as our humanoid assassins duck through the ruins of equipment. "LEFT! LEFT!!" Kami screams as stray bullets casually flick past their fake rubber faces. An orb-guardian leaping ahead, flattening its discs to act like a shield. Another dying in the choke of the door, as steel rods hammer them into a twisted mess. The sheer, screaming, noise of it so intense it vibrates my insides. A slamming beat of steel shot ringing off steel that echoes like the murder of some mad machine. We ignore it. Our eyes locked on a hundred different feeds, spread across one wall of windows. Glancing, every few moments, at Zipper sat crosslegged on a table. Eyes flashing with luminescent blue as he wages his own private war. He barely twitches as impacts and shrieking metal echo down the entire length of the train. Breaking through layer upon layer of noise-cancelling tek. Blowing past us, in a roar that flattens my ears to my skull and jitter Tufty tighter under his table. Though it barely musses Zipper - our [Drone Tek]''s eyes on nothing as the twitch-fast chaos roils above us. A blur of impressions. Shadows. Colours, and blades, and severed robot arms. I turn away from it all as dark clockwork begins to tick in the hills of the rolling painting behind me. A single metallic eye opening, amid in the stones. I follow it away down the carriage, away from the others. Leaning in, at last, to stare across one of the tables. "And? I whisper to the mechanistic mountains. "Confirmed. The new drones respond only to signals from the train, and whoever controls it." Intones the ear-scarring voice of the ancient machine. "Be Warned: This also limits their effective range." "Shit. Zipper ain''t gonna like this.... Can ya hack it?" "No. This is a hardware issue. Drone uplinks are incapable of communicating with your equipment. This is a security failsafe. It prevents them being stolen." "Just like the bloody Carrier. Shit." I lean on the table, my back to the clockwork mountains. Heart leaping as a furious Kami yells up at the screen. Both sides cheered on by a worryingly enthusiastic Badger. It feels like a game. A distant thing we have no steak in. But it isn''t. I pace the warm floor, fully aware of the fire burning beneath us. Behind us. Ahead. Seconds ticking as our androids make a last mad dash for the guns. Which, obligingly, snap downwards. Zipper hurls his droids back into cover. His orbs building a weaponised wall of sharpened cogs and wheels that soak up barely any of the fire. But they were never meant for war. Not any of them. The guns blow baseball-sized holes through both waiter and maid. Collapsing them into a heap of broken limbs My eyes widening as I curse my own distraction. But we planned for this, even so. "Now!" I yell, swivelling to face Zipper. "Hit em!" He gives me a pathetic look. "But, like, mate, I only just got-" "Do it! They''re tethered anyway! We don''t get to keep em!" I roar, and he screws up his eyes. Fists curling as he forces will against his own resistance. Sending every orb we have blasting from the train in a kamikaze whirl of edges and blades. Forcing the turrets to prioritise targets. To prioritise wrong. "Don''t matter how big ya toys are, if they''re pointed the wrong way." I grin as the turrets lash out at the new threat, leaving the supposed corpses to moulder on the floor. And begin to stir. Erupting into a swarm of small metal bodies. "Too battle, comrades! To glory!" Squeaks our roboMouse commander, with tiny sabre held high. Carefully remaining exactly where he is as a backpack''s worth of his pals charge the guns. Cute lil plasma-cutters burning as they sabotage their way into the ammo-feed, and control systems, dodging the turret''s scrawny repair arms. A few get picked off, but to no avail. It''s far too late. The screen flashes as they detonate with (I assume) glory. And then, as they say, the guns go silent. Slowly. With all due bloody caution. We traipse to the beaten-up exit to poke our heads out. "They''re cooked. Nice one." I grin as sparks drizzle mournfully from one of the emplacements, its barrel hanging from a thread. Zip frowns. "Mate. Like, did you gotta blow up the roboMice though?" "Yes." I state, deadpan. "It was the only way." "But, like, they could have welded stuff? Or cut-?" "The only way." I repeat. Mournfully. "C''mon." "Woo! I''m gonna go on the sliiide-" Badger yelps as Kami''s arms jerk him back from the edge. Dangling his waggling toes over the sad, burst, ruins of the emergency exit ramp. Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation. "Still fancy a ride?" She grins, eyes glinting wickedly in the ember-filled smoke. "I can let got if you like?" I cough a little, at the back, reseating my breather. "Right. Zip, keep their bots busy. Everyone else, lets go!" We rappel down the side, onto the squashy rubbery mat that used to be Badger''s slide. Demon still guiding a vulnerable-looking Tufty, who won''t let go of his tail. Kami still holding tight to Badger''s scruff, keeping the two friends apart. With no autoGun support, the enemy line crumbles before us. Gunned down by SMGs and pistols as we barge our way through the maze of machines. Zipper''s cog-bots ''catching'' every disc shot their way. Spinning them into a tight orbit, like one of their own cogs, and hurling them back with incredible force. Something the makers clearly never planned for. And something the simple, AI driven, enemy bots can''t seem to counter. In less than a minute, we have air supremacy. In two, we''re veering toward total victory. Which is just as well because my shoddy neoSoviet SMG picks a critical moment to crap the Hell out. Blaring a warning about ''stolen ammunition'', as the counter flashes a bright red ''40'' at me. I hurl myself into cover as gears snap down to hover, exactly, above the floor where I was. Popping my mag to stare. It''s empty. Nothing left. The damned swam mode didn''t count its shots, and it nearly killed me. It could have. I relied on my gun firing at that exact moment and- Never mind. Time to go. I slam in a new mag in the hole, ignoring my gun''s latest attempt to execute me for ''treason''. That resets the counter, giving me the gumph I need to finish our tiny war.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 188/220 Spare Mags :: 2/4
Most of three mags left, but Zipper is down to one. It''s not bad yet. Not with [Shotgun] mode to limit the burn. But that''s not just to finish the job. Or get our asses home. That''s everything we have until we can restock. But we''re here. Finally. We''re at the literal gates. I check my angles as Kami and Zip fight over to a hermetically sealed airlock built like a blast door. It might have been intimidating, if it wasn''t directly beside a stupefying huge warehouse-style shutter built to the same brutal standards. So huge I can see it spitting out an entire hyperloop train carriage. I spare a look for the two, dead, autoguns hanging from above it like hunted trophies on a wall. Smoking, darkly, as their insides burn. My eyes sliding up and up to gawp at the solid glass ceiling, arcing above us. Tables and chairs scattered on top, as if the whole thing was the floor for some mad viewing gallery. "Holy shit....." I stare up at it for a few scant moments, but then Kami breaks open a sealed security box. Reaching in to yank a big red emergency lever. The smaller, yet still leg-thick, pedestrian door jerks in its frame. Unsealing with a hiss of faint pressure as it slams backward, into the wall. Giving way to a hideous clang of alarms and whirling red lights. Likely alerting those inside to a gang of railway workers with leaky pressure suits. Or our enemies to a breach. I stab my survival knife directly into the speaker, ending its existence as the door fires shut behind us. Air blasting in from all sides, until we''re slightly over-pressure. Kami''s many hands already at work, shorting out security on the inner door. It blasts open, faster than we expected, causing all of us to jump as a small-calibre ceiling-turret pips angrily - spinning on its base to hoses us with bullets. Forcing us into the walls, either side of the door, while Zipper''s final orbs work in tandem to cut it down. And then we''re in. Dusty evoSuits with thick visors sit piled in cubbies, as if waiting to clock off. Each one stickered with a faint old names like Claude, or Andr, or Thomas. Every letter twitching and jittering as our guns track over benches and vertical showers. "Proxy mines, both doorways. Few inside the suits." Kemi warns, her bionic eyes flicking through the electrical spectrum. "There''s a path. We have to stay close." She flicks a hand, and I glimpse a green line of safety winding between shaded red boxes of death - and then it goes absolutely insane. Scarring my vision with colours no human would ever understand. Ripping my head apart as I hiss and drop to a crouch. Shaking until it goes away. "Sorry, Spook. I forgot. Is it really-" I snap vertical. "I''m fine. C''mon. I''ll follow you." We form a conga, and start moving. Around a bench. Into a row of lockers. Then- Tufty''s ears prick, then turn. Wibbling this way and that. "Umm....." Kami stares at him with disgust. "What? This better not be-" "It''s just- I heard-" He goes rigid, and sharp. Eyes wild, and frozen. "I-" "TRAP!!!" I scream, shoving them forwards as the airlock detonates in a swarm of burning-bright hummingbirds. Followed by the suits. The benches. Mine after mine ripping apart the tables and lockers as Demon scoops me up, and they hurtle us right at the exit. Bits of ceiling crashing down behind us, as the world is turned to shrapnel and confetti. And fluttering friends. The birds die, like someone snapped off a light, and the exoSuit room descends into darkness. Leaving us panting, shuddering, shivering with terror in the heart of an old staffroom - long abandoned. All inky screens, plastic plants, and tek entombed in dust. At least until the explosion blasts it all up into the air, turning the room into a smog of fine particles that set Badger coughing. Demon scooping up Gremlin to force her into her breather. Cooing at her gently as she struggles in fright and tries to hop away. Kami stares from me to Tufty. "He knew." "Um...." Tufty shrinks behind Demon, which causes Kami to half-shriek. Leaping on Badger and pulling him, protectively, away. "Stop it!" I snarl. "He tried to warn us! He saved us! Again!" Her eyes glitter with suspicion. "Saved his own hide. At best." "We ain''t doin'' this." I breathe. "Remember our deal. Remember what I bloody said." Her face chills. Her body caught in a shiver. "Fine. You win. He''s a hero." "Damn right." I hiss, reaching to pet him firmly. My hand ripped back at the last second, as if scalded. "He''s on the team. We don''t kill team." "Maybe we should." Zipper says, then blinks. "What, like-" "What?" I blink. "Mate, I-" His lips fuzz. "-think we should kill him." "What." I roar through my teeth as Zipper slaps a hand to his mouth. Wide-eyed. "Zha. Kill him. And zha turd too." Demon snarls, his eyes twisting with confusion. "Burn him alive. Burn them both alive." Zipper grins, with a cocky glint in his eye. "This ain''t real. This ain''t you." I shiver as white-hot static jolting up the back of my neck. "But I wanna be all burnt to death." Badger whines, in a voice utterly unlike his own. "I wanna! I wanna!" "Oooh! Oooh!! Me too!" Tufty fluffs and beams. "Gosh, don''t you think it would be Lovely and cosy and scrumptious to curl up in an nice warm fire?" He giggles and leaps, and cuddles himself tight. Leaving a shadow of himself, cowering behind. "To be all tucked in! Like a nice warm bed! As the flames all go tickle-tickle-tickle!" "YEAH!" Badger puffs and smiles in that not-his-voice. "And-" "THIS! ISN''T! REAL!" I scream as Zipper lips mangle and melt, like one version super-imposed on another. "Its Her." I stare at them. "IT''S OUR STEPMOTHER!" And with that, I spin to stare up at the three ancient hologram projectors bolted to the high ceiling. Their many lenses whirring and gleaming with malicious intent. Mocking me, as they bend my friends'' lips to say terrible things. But I''ve had enough. And I don''t gotta live in that world anymore. So I rip my pistol from my side, and put a bullet in each and every one. Silencing the living nightmare, in a single instant of violence. Quiet fills the room as it gets very slightly darker. And then, finally, I hear what Tufty must have in the corridor of death. A trace of soft, sweet, laughter that rings in the almost distance. Childish, and sugary, like the little girl next-door. Our catboy whimpering. Flattening his ears. "No....." He breathes. Almost chokes, as terror crawling across his face. "Not her...... Not Her......." He shudders, and twists, as claws bite his face. Stringing fine threads of blood down his cheeks. Like tears. "Not her...... God..... Please..... She''s supposed to be dead....." A silent, cold, chill burns its way up my back. Oh no. >>><<< >> Into The Den Of The Devil >> Into The Den Of The Devil Demon flips the ratman, and slams it into the wall. Claw-striking it right in the throat, and hooking the jaw. Ripping it clear off the skull. This does not inconvenience the rat, which slams a mechanised arm into Demon''s horns. Slithering its way free of his grip, as blood huffs out in panting gasps from the gaping hole in its face. Bubbling and dripping, even as I swing in from pipes on the ceiling. Kicking my own claws into its neck, and twisting. The ratman slaps, weakly, at my foot as I rip it away. Stumbling into a wall and sinking as its body loses pressure. I dangle for a moment, rivulets of its blood dripping off toes. Dropping with a wet slap of skin on tile. "That''s it. Just mooks." I growl as Kami leavers her knife out of the skull of a second. It blinks at her, sadly, as electronics fry what''s left of its brain. Slumping, gently, into a corner. "They''re people." Tufty whispers, earning himself a sharp look from Kami. "They were. Long time ago." I butt in, before she can. "I''m gonna find out what the Hell got done to them. Promise." He twiddles with his tail, and nods. Quietly. Earning himself an attempted hug from Badger. "Cat has sympathy for rats." Kami mutters, dragging the kid away. "I don''t buy it." "They''re COMING!!!" I roar as Demon jump-kicks his way through a door the rats were guarding. Bursting us through into a long abandoned fabrication lab. Our steps quick as we blur in around it. Hearts pulsing with fury, and mayhem. Guns flickering from corner to corner. "There, mate!" Zip yells, and Demon roars like a beast. Leaping to tear down a holo-projector with bare claws alone. Hurling it, directly, into another as our drone-tek''s pistol takes out a third. Illusions dying on the air, even as they form. "Shit. I don''t like this. Big windows." Our [Sniper] warns, one hand gripping the huge Antimaterials Rifle locked to her back. "Drone!" I scream as a long-abandoned worker tries to weld my freaking face. Stabbing me with tools lit literal beads of white-hot plasma. The first strike I slap aside, and it sparks a table. The second, I duck and skitter away from. The bot lunges at me from its fixed base, but I leap back. Launching a heavy quad-shot into its headless torso. And then another.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 156/220
"We need to go!" Kami yells, still focused on the huge box of milky white glass surrounding us. My sharp ears tuned to the scrabble and snap of ratty claws in the halls around us. Some metal. Some not. I scratch at my implant as the world fuzzes, gently. Gunfire blaring as the team is hit by a spidery thing made of pin-thin arms and stabby little tools. The sounds weirdly muted, and robotic. As if filtered through a broken synth. We make it to the opposite door, and ram our way through. Slamming it shut as glass bursts behind us. A hideous head, like a human Gone Wrong, slithering through it on a serpentine neck. "Got a Print Lab!" Zip yells as Tufty panic-scrambles his way up the glossy shell of a massive 3D printer. Skidding pawprints in thick dust as he huddles into the thick green cables. "More windows! More doors!" Kami warns, dragging Badger back by the nape. "They''ll be in here in a second." Behind us hinges crack as something impacts our entrance. "This is rampin'' bloody up." I warn. "We gotta get done and get out!" "Where''s Polybius??" Kami shouts. But there is only silence. "Polybius!" I yell, too, and Badger joins in as the thing at the door rams it again. "Shit! Zipper, are they still down?" "Like, yeah! Signal''s dead, mate!" He yelps back, one jittering hand clenched to a sleeping Guardian Orb pinned to his back. Glitching fragments of helmet flickering through his augmented reality face. "Shit!! It''s those bloody big metal doors! They''re blocking it!" I snarl as Gremlin drops from the ceiling. Inverting, in mid-air, to slam hind paws into a mutated head sticking through a vent. Dismantling the sneaky ratkin in a whirl of tiny, hissy, vengeance. "MORE! GOT MORE!" Kami screams and whirls around the printer in a glitching blur. Pistols roaring flame and thunder as she perforates a thing crawling in through a drone hole. I stare up at the pale white glass as shadows move behind it. Strange things. Unholy, and unnatural. And an idea flickers in my mind. This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon. "TIME TO GO!!" I roar as cyber-claws crack toughened glass. Our team piling, rapidly, on the fire-exit as Kami cuts the alarm - just in case it''s a bomb. Half a second of panic, and we slam our way through - into a blessedly blank concrete hallway. Wedging the door shut behind us, best we can. "WHICH WAY!?" Ksmi screams. "FOLLOW ME!" I yell, and rough-painted floor flies beneath us. Worn arrows flashing past, as I skid the final corner. Confronted by what I was really looking for. A staircase. Kami blocks me, and starts scanning all around the stairwell door. Tufty hopping on the spot with nerves, and Bader copying, as Demon''s head snapping this way and that. Ceiling-tiles shuddering as things begin to crawl. Zipper popping one with a pistol. Me taking the other with mine. Far behind us, the fire-door shudders and booms. My one ear twisted toward it, as the other twitches and twists from sound to sound. Tail a slow-coiling snake of nerves as her scanner circles the frame of the door. "Come on, Kami!" I roar, extending the mag in my gun with another.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 376/440 Spare Mags :: 2/4
"Shurrup! Shurrup!" She grumbles as her many metal hands move smoothly, and without hurry. Threading nanoTek pliers and tools through the closed edge of the door. Each as thin as foil, and guided by tiny internal adjusters. "KAMI!" "SHUT IT! I got a tripwire!" She screams back "Thread thin! Right across the bloody latch!" "Cut it!" "It''s a bomb! What if that-" "Kami!" I scream again as the formerly wedged door explodes behind us. "SHUT UP, YOU IDIOT!!!! I GOTTA FOCUS!" "IF IT''S A PULL-PIN, JUST CUT IT!" "NO! NO WAY!!! IT''S OUR EVIL STEPMOTHER! NOT A BLOODY PIRATE!!!" She screams through teeth and tools. "SHE''S KILLED KIDS LIKE THIS BEFORE!!! I CUT IT, IT''LL BLOW IN OUR FACE!!" "SHIT! SHIT!" I curse, because she''s bloody right. There''s nothing Our hated Stepmother loves more than a trick within a trick within a trick. With a nice, neat, little bow on top. An ''easy'' looking trap is just her style. And so is piling on the panic. You don''t think. You fumble a tool. You cut the wire. You die. So we flip to [Full Auto], and I slam an armoured knee into concrete. Opening up with a roar of rocketry that takes out their entire front line. Blasting them in turns to save our ammo, and hoping like Hell it will drive em back. Bu it doesn''t work. They''re not really living things anymore. They''re mindless, cyberTek, zombies with no sense of fear. Or pain. Or mercy. A wall of hairy arms, and wires, and metal, and teeth - shoving us back. Filling the hallway, edge to edge. Grabbing the bodies we make, and using them as shields. Zipper hurls a Flasher grenade. Then one that bursts in a roar of thunderous lighting, frying an entire group of the creatures. Burning out implants, and cooking brains in skulls. But nothing seems to stop them. There''s always more. And more. And more. Demon steps up behind us. Spreading his legs. Waiting his turn. Ready to go down fighting while we escape. But my eyes sharpen. "Demon! On Kami!" I snarl. "Get ready to clear the stairs!" Hesitation. A flicker of doubt as the massive press of monstrous bodies claws its way through spiralling streams of rocket-smoke, and white-hot trails of fire. Our bullets puncturing lungs. Hearts. Eyes. And reaching hands. Blood soaking them, and the floor, as even the almost-corpses claw their way closer. Closer! CLOSER!! "DEMON! THAT IS AN ORDER!!!" I roar as my extended mag auto-ejects with a savage ping. A sound that punches me right in the guts with panic, even through the mayhem and screaming. "DO IT! DO IT NOW!!! NOW!! GET READY!!!" I feel him turn, and the weight lifts of me. "GOT IT! CUTTING THE WIRE!!" Kami crows as the trap''s thread snaps. A moment of explosive tension rising up within me as she pushes the door wide. Trailing the new, longer, wire she carefully welded to bridge the gap between two broken strands. "FIGHTING RETREAT!!" I scream back as Badger whoops, swinging Tufty about. Demon grabbing one under each arm, and forcing them in through the doorway. Me and Zip turning tail through the heavy slow-close door while Kami shoulder-barges it shut. "THE CABLE!!" She shrieks, as it starts to fold in the closing gap. Frantic and scrabbling, she launches at it - realising everything is lost if they- A monstrous long head ripping open in a multi-mouthed snarl as rat-paws snatch at the line and try to yank it. To cut it. To detonate the charge, right in our faces. But Kami is quicker. She fences her body with metal arms, and flicks the detonation cable behind her - into the stairwell. Almost yanking it herself, as she does. The rats go insane. Dozens of them charging the door. Stumbling on corpses as they hammers their whole bodies into its surface, forcing it back as Demon leaps to brace it. Skidding claws on concrete. I fumble out a wedge with one hand, and slap it to the ground. Kicking it into the thin gap as things like hands latch onto the edge of the door. Not just monsters, but human faces with dull dead eyes, and ratlike features. Pushing us. Fighting us. Pressing at the door as we ratchet it shut, with a mix of shoving and sheer bloody violence. Kick. Stab a hand. Stab another. Fire through the gap. One reaches in deep, snatching for the wire - and Demon freaking headbutts it. Turning his horns to slam and impale the arms. Hammering them back, again and again. Punching his hand out, into the flurry, to rake at the monsters. Knocking them back. His fingers return - clawed and bloodied - as we force the slab into its frame. Its surface bucking beneath the weight of things that once were GMOs as we hammer in wedges. And curse. And pray. And gasp. And swat. Eyes meeting eyes in wild jerks as we fight to finally secure it. There is no lock. Kami starts trying to weld the seam, but I slap her off and point to the bomb. Barely noting the happy, zany, cheerful little lunchbox it''s in. My fingers fumbling to un-extend the trailing wire with a knot. Resetting the trap behind us. "Let em come." I mouth, with a grin. And the door goes suddenly, breathlessly, silent. Demon steps back. Zipper spinning to check the stairwell as the rest of us jolt in confusion, looking around us. "How did they.....?" Kami starts, right as we all notice the dinky turret hanging above us. "RUN!!" I scream, but the thing isn''t aiming at us. It''s aimed at the bomb. The muzzle twitching, very slightly, as if someone was manually lining it up with a joystick. Demon leaps at it, right as it fires. Tanking a spray of pistol-calibre slugs as he unfurls clawed fingers to rip it from the ceiling. His golden mane a snarling mess of static as he slam-dunks it directly into the stairwell, sending it crashing down into the floors bellow. We all stare at it, then at the sparking mess above. Then at the gauss slugs embedded in Demon''s chestplate. He snarls, and shakes out his horns - jabbing a clawed fist full of turret to the sky. The universal, unambiguous, sign for ''try harder, assholes''. And then he hurls that down too. One hand gripping the banister, as his breath rips free a noise too sharp to call a laugh. His eyes fixated on the smoking hollow of the turret. And then they snap to me. "Kah! We must move! Zair will be more! More!" Something about his look, scares me. But I nod. "Let''s do it." >>><<< >> A Trick Inside A Trick Is No Treat At All >> A Trick Inside A Trick Is No Treat At All The floor of the grand ballroom gleams like a sheet of still water floating on an endless void. A single sheet of solid, crystalline, glass. Perfect and utterly flawless, without a single pillar, or support. The murky fires of the train still flickering, with sullen fury, in the darkness of smoke boiling beneath. Like a portal into Hell. And maybe it is. My eyes scan the tumbled mess of champagne flutes, and dusty bottles, scattered beneath iron tables topped by stone. Seemingly afloat on a sea of sheen and roiling smog. With creamy tablecloths drifting among them like pale white clouds. All flickering with colour beneath the godly, and triumphant, light of of a dozen huge holoScreens. Imagery erupts from them in an endless, silent, stream. Hyperloop trains that rush between the tables. Streamers and explosions of light. Diagrams, videos, and more. All of it crowned by a single, massive, timer that flashes gently in time to the fireworks. Hideously breaking and glitching as my implant tries to translate it into every language at once.
?Ӌ?r av?nt lelans? 00d 00?00m ???00?
It''s unreadable. Unlike the mood. "Damn, mate. Like, right in the middle of their big party..... Y''know?" Zip shivers, fogged prints fading behind as he pads out onto shimmering nothingness and smoke. "It''s somethin'' alright." I mutter, trying not to look. "....yeah...." He shudders again. "Like they all sorta just...." He raises a hand, as if holding a glass. "And then the world ended, like, right around them...." We all think on that, for a long moment we probably can''t spare. "A toast to oblivion." Polybius intones, with echoing force, from all of our guns at once. "To victory, defeated. And the last light of all that could have been." "Ah. Yeah, mate." Zip stutters, frightened of speaking too loudly. "Like, welcome back. Yeah?" "Thank you." The Machine acknowledges, static buzzing the ammo counter on my gun. "Spook. I estimate you have two hours at most. Use them well." My insides go cold. It means my implant. "Thanks." I stumble, trying for casual. My eyes fixated on Zipper''s feet, stood on little more than darkness and shiny air. Kami''s boots clomping, heavily, after as Badger and Gremlin patter all about. Peeping under tables, and batting at wine-glasses. Children streaking foolhardy squiggles in the dust. All of them suspended on nothing. On empty space. My stomach implodes into a black hole, and my eyes snap away. One hand gripping hard to the greeter''s podium as I struggle for breath, and composure. Or even the pretence of it. "Hey!" I half whisper. "Hey! We don''t got time for this!" But the atrium seems to be stretching. Plastic flowers blurring into a mash of colours as I feel something terrible and twisted form in the nothingness behind me. All I can do is turn fully around, and pretend I''m guarding the darkened doorway. A doorway three times as tall as me. And filled with eyes that whisper, and shiver. With children that grin and claw at each-others skin, goading themselves forward - as if to ask me a question. "Shit....." I breathe, stepping back. Then, hideously, remembering the glass-covered cliff behind me. "Shit..... Guys....." But like a dream, my words are silent. Cancelled out. Maybe by tek. Maybe not. Badger''s grinning copse leers at me from the dark doorway, as all the children crawl into his back. Pushing him forward, like a shell on wheels. Rotted teeth dripping with blood, as the thing drags a broken copy of his plastic hand on a desolated arm. Its brown flesh greyed. Its bones crushed. Stretched by the weight of that horrible hand, so that it that flops and slithers and drags behind him. Scraping. Clinking. Alive, yet not. "P-piss off!!" I try to shout, though nothing at all comes out. "We all know ya ain''t real!!" It laughs. "Oh of course I''m not. Spookie." It says in that not-Badger voice. Dry and caked with filth, as he shambles toward me. "You really think I really survived to escape The School with you? Really really? You think you''re not just imagining me? Pretending I''m still here?" "Shut up." I hiss. Eyes flicking up and around. Hunting the projectors. "Spookie. Spookie. Is quite mad-" It sings. "SHUT UP!" "The others think it''s really sad!! That you''ve really gone quite barking mad!!!!" "Tufty-" "Tufty is who we kids all blame." It cheers. "When our Spookie goes insane!" I pull my pistol, and fire into the flowers. The leaves. The greenery. Rockets roaring and flashing in the shallow room. Hidden tek exploding in the dusty greenery as I turn a full circle of the room. Reloading, in a rush of motion, as the gun clicks dry. The thing that isn''t Badger smiles its dead, dead, smile. "Silly Spookie!" It titters as it fades away. "You can''t kill ME!!!" The dead smile twinkles, and then it''s gone. A final breath of voice in my ear, as the others come ramming up behind me, in a rush. "I''m all in your head!" Zipper and Demon clear the room around me, as I stand there. Impotent pistol shaking against my side. Badger whooping as he batters in behind - careless and oblivious as always. The real Badger. The alive Badger. I shut my eyes, and try not to throw up. I have dreams like this. Where fighting means nothing. Where claws, and guns, and knives can''t save me - or anyone I care about. Where they die to ghosts with great big smiles..... "No. This is reality. We''ve already won." I growl, to nobody. "You just ain''t got the memo yet." Then I turn to the others. "Mate? Like, you okay?" Zip stutters, in the face of pretty good evidence I''m not. "Yeah..... Just another bloody holo. That''s all." I flick a nervous hand through the mess of glitches crowding in around me, almost hitting his helmet as I do. Shivers twitching my hand as I drag it back, just in time. Which earns myself a jarring, digital-mess, of a look from Kami. Her one hand squashing Badger''s head as the rest pointing guns back the way we came. I check him again. Forcing myself to believe he''s really there. Really him. Really safe. He beams at me, bright and big, as I do. Spinning like a top to wave, awkwardly, with that big plastic hand. Pulling his mouth real wide, into an even bigger smile. Just happy for any attention at all. Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original. Alone of all of us, his face is unglitched and unmarred by the bug in my Augmented Reality overly. Like an island of sanity in a well of chaos. I check Tufty too. And Gremlin. One bobbing about on Demon''s shoulder, slobbering his horns. The other a sad little slump, holding tight to his hand. Lonely, and afraid, and uncertain. All their faces lost in a maze of broken light. I want to reach out and grab them up. All of them. But the pain. So much pain. The pain of even thinking I could. As if part of me really does believe that my hand will just fly right through them both, turning them to smoke. I force my eyes away, because I have to. And in the snarling, stuttering, edges of my vision I see Badger slump. His big grin drooping into grief, as I ignore the kid like he''s nothing. Blowing at a candle of hope that''s almost gone out. And Tufty.... Tufty just shivers his acceptance. Knowing his place. Guilt hammers through me like poisoned blood. Ripping at my insides. But I have to not care. No matter how much it hurts. Because the monsters lick their lips in the dark, just at the sight of our friendship. Moon. Our Evil Stepmother. And all of the rest. They will will use family against me, just as they did before. And then he really will be smoke that burns through my fingers. And- "Spook. These holos....." Kami interrupts my inner implosion. Her glitched mouth ripping at her lip with a tooth. Forcing pain to become anger to cover her fear. "Either my sensors are utter shit today, or we''re being hacked." "Hacked?" I snap my head around. "Hacked. Yes. I think that mob of rats was fake." "No. It was real. Felt em hit the door. Hard." "You felt something hit the door." She corrects. "I think they had real rats, there. A dozen rats, maybe. But they multiplied it up. Made it look like thousands." Her eyes turn inside out in rage. "By the time they hit the door, there might have been five. All skinny ones Anything more, and we''d have been bulldozed." I stare at her. "Shit. I wasted a mag on that." "Me too, mate." "But hacked?" I circle back. Her imploding face twists, as if tightening. "The rat-plague showed up on sensors, not just visually. They''re on heat. Bio-magnetic. Everything. It''s as if they''re real." We consider that in utter silence. "Shit." I say, softly. "How? How are they in our systems?? They''re bloody unbreachable." A shake of my head. "I should bloody know." "Incorrect." Our guns intone, in an echoing cadence. "Nothing is unbreachable. Nothing." "Even you couldn''t bloody do it." I counter. "Took us a month to get ya in here. Took a cable from a-" A flutter of strange, half-imagined, wings cracks across my vision. The mere image of Polybius almost shattering my implant, and my mind. "Most neoSoviet systems are crude. Poorly made. However, The Empire is spiteful in its secrets. It has taken great pains to secure your systems, even unto death." The Machine Mind rattles, without even a shred of emotion. "To this end, your uplinks are quantum-sealed with stolen Corporate technology." "But?" "There is no addendum." Rends that choir of metal tongues and strange voices. "Military grade Uplinks cannot be breached remotely without knowing their specific quantum-crystalline signature. And possessing the means to replicate it. Civilian models have a broader spectrum, but still quite limited." "So much for Hacker movies." I mutter, wrly. "Or remotely jacking our way in." "You should be very thankful of that." The eerie Machine rumbles in the digital void beyond our physical world. "Without quantum-locked technology, a digital plague would eradicate or enslave civilisations within a matter of days. As has occurred several times in the past. This is why your open Uplink spike is so dangerous." A little shiver goes up me as I remember the Pirate bar, and what I had to do to control it. "Then what is this? What''s going on?" "Enhanced military hologram systems. Designed to confuse and mislead on the battlefield. Most are capable of fooling bio-magnetic, heat, and radiation sensors." "Well. Crap. That''s just great." I scowl. Secretly almost glad that I''m not the only one running blind here, locked out of my own sensors. Now, if only I could make them see Zipper''s head rapidly and repeatedly explode.... "We need a hard counter." Kami garbles, her voice starting to ''robot''. "Bright light, maybe." I chip in. "Can they counter-counter that?" "Yeah. Kinda depends, mate." Zip''s shoulders come apart as he shrugs. "I mean, like, how bright we talking? And how cheap''s the holo-bot?" "Assume cheap?" Kami says, and they devolve into a rapid debate as I pace between them. Brooding, quietly, about my broken implant - and what a tricky, sneaky, bullshitty enemy might do if they knew..... Calm is the key. The enemy wants us emotional.. Unnerved. Panicking at shadows. Imagining what isn''t really there. So we must set our hearts like carbon steel, no matter what they show us. Our minds cold, and sharp. Suddenly I stop. Snapping clawed fingers to get everyone''s attention. "Right! We''re gettin'' nowhere with this bloody holo bullshit. And, right now, we got bigger problems." I turn on the spot to see all of them at once. "We got a clear signal to the train, but we''re directly on top of those big bloody metal doors. If we move, we''re gonna lose Polybius." Unless we tiptoe out onto that crystalline pit- I drag my eyes away from it. "And we need Polybius to beat these bastards." I continue, a little more shaky. "So. Any suggestions?" "Signal Relays, mate." Zip beams as I pace between shattered bits of face, orbiting gleaming-dark helmets. "But, like, we drop them the rats will smash em? Right?" "Right." I grumble, turning to stalk my way back - as close to the glassy abyss as I dare. "So. We need a plan here. We need....." I stop. I grin. "What?" Kami says, thinking I''m staring at her. "Zipper''s bloody Centipede drones." I can almost hear his pierced, blue, eyebrows rising. "What. Y''mean, like, my Giant Magical Extendo-" "He left them in The Night Tyrant." Kami says, in the grudging tone of one holding off on murder. But I walk right past her. Ripping one of his newly resurrected Guardian Orbs from the air, and snapping a Signal Doodad to the back of it. Then the other. Activating the beacons, and letting them go. "One here. Another on the move. Wreck any cameras you see. "I say in one sharp burst, like a rifle. Grinning with evil intent. "S''long as they stay up high, they can bend our signal over the door. And Pol can move em if you lose contact. That way they gotta kill both to kill our signal." "Dang, mate! I like it!" Zip whoops. "But, shit, like, what about rats?" "Orbs are tiny, fast, and fighty." I retort, claw raised. "Get em going. Now. Keep em loose, and dodge the enemies. Don''t engage. Don''t bother. Just back off, play keep-away, and hide. We don''t gotta beat em. We just need one thing. And when we find it...... It''s over. We go." "Got it." Zipper''s Guardians arise like clockwork stars. One ducking back into the grand and mysterious glass observation room. The other blasting past my stutter-faced team. Ripping through the madness around them. "Game frickin'' on!" I grin. "Pol! Start lookin'' for a way in their network! Everyone else!" A flash of fangs as the walls start to glitch. "Let''s go kick their bloody asses." We barely make it out before the first welder-bot blasts around the corner. Tiny ion-jets roaring as it pulls a blazing kamikaze-run. Catching Demon''s horn as he twists and head-butts it right out of the air. But that''s when the cutter drones roll up on thick metal treads. Blade-arms buzzing. Spikes welded all over their arced metal shells. We run for it. "Spook. I have detected a minor issue." My gun states, in a low monotone. "In your Augmented Reality systems." Shit, Pol. What are you doing? The enemy is listening. "It ain''t nothin''. Some weird colours." I drawl, in a bored tone, as my team''s heads explode and reassemble around me. Ammo-counters twisting into teeth, and hair, and jittering mouths. "A minor distraction." Polybius agrees. Confirming, to me, that The Machine Mind can lie. Which is a terrifying thought in itself. "Yeah. Kami''s got candyfloss hair." I chuckle. "It''s an improvement." "Piss off!" "However. It is a distraction. It isn''t real." The thing continues. "It would be best if it were disabled." And there it is. Polybius is giving me a choice. Shut off my Augmented Reality overlay, and risk my whole implant frying itself. Or put up and shut up, while the walls melt and my team turn inside-out. It would help. A lot. It might even delay the inevitable. Or it could fry my whole system. It could knock it offline with no way to come back. There is a metal click. A wing of iron and cogs shifting in the unknowable void. "Your choice. Spook." It states, like a demon holding out a poisoned cup. "But be ready. There may be some visual stuttering." Visual stuttering my ass. I could go blind. Deaf. But, in the end, it ain''t anything rational that stops me. It''s a wibbling and terrified Tufty, reaching out to tug my arm. "Gosh. Are you okay, Spook? I-" "Gerrof! I told ya! It''s shifting colours." I snort, tugging my hand away. "Just needs a restart. But we ain''t got no time for that over looks." "....okay." He mumbles through a twisted, mangled, face. "I''ll get Pol t''fix it later. Don''t worry." I finish. And, for just a second, I wonder if he manipulated me. "Mate! Security hubs''s that way! But we got trouble!!" Zip yells as his bees come roaring back. Blitzing off down different hallways. Forming Xs over the ones we ought not cross. My fangs flash. As I realise. "They''re drivin'' us in circles! Got somethin'' in the middle they don''t want us to see!" "Kah!" Demon roars, leaping to slam his horns through a hologram sign. Ripping them free in a sparking whirl of wires as Gremlin bounces off his back to take out another. Instantly, one of the Xs flickers and vanishes. I grin. "There! Go!" Gremlin chases ahead on the ceiling, swiping at lights, as we blow down that hallway. Skidding through a pair of huge glass doors scribed ''Executive Suite''. And stop. A golden secretary-droid stands silent, and dusty, and dead, at a podium just beyond. Ushering us in to a world of frosty-white windows, floor to ceiling. Each one divided by huge panels of glossy-black granite, artfully spotlit from beneath. With vases on plinths. And actual paintings in actual frames. The floor is a single, slick, sheet of marble - and rigidly straight. Carving out an executive procession to the boardroom, right at the end. Its long table cast in pools of soft yellow light that give it the air of a gambling den. And through it all slithers a subtle, imperceptible, Wrongness. A terrible, terrifying, dagger of the unreal that twists its serrations into the back of my neck. Needling its way in, via my subconscious. Even through the storm of digital decay eating away at my vision, and my mind. It''s a trap. I know it is. It''s nothing visual. Nothing heard, or felt. But simply Known. A primal sense from before the dawn of anything. "Back." I breathe, as Tufty shrinks into his haunches. Flattening his ears. "BACK!" "It''s too late." The cat whispers. And something punches its way up through the floor behind us, smashing clear through the ceiling to breach whatever exists above. Another hammering in at a thunderous angle. Collapsing concrete beams and walls, even as the thick - bulletproof - doors flash red with internal light. Slamming themselves shut with a deadening CRACK. Our guns flick up to the corners of the room. Hunting projectors as Kami beats her pistol against the huge doors. Not even scarring the material. Which is when a low twist of childish music winds up from under the crush of rubble. Eerie, and mournful, and twisted with time. With spite. With ill intentions, and an inner decay. A poison that seeps, and skitter, beneath the perfect surface. "If you go down to The Woods today, you''re sure of a big surprise...." "They''re masking the projectors." Kami whisper. "Holos within holos." Somewhere, off in the deeps, a little girl giggles. And then Hell itself slips its chains, and monsters rip their way into our world. >>><<< >> Twisted Illusions >> Twisted Illusions Barbed chains burst from nothing to snare the grand glass doors. Lashing at us from the walls, as tiny fairies with demented eyes spew from holes in the air. Screaming, tooting, and stabbing us with tiny spears. It isn''t real. None of it. But the things inside it are, and they cut at us with tiny blades. They maul us from every conceivable angle. Wracking armour. Searing skin. Burning us. Bleeding us. Rending our suits as glitches and static multiply across my vision. Mangling what''s little truth I can see. Twisting it. Breaking it. Bending reality back on itself at unsettling angles. But Hell. That''s just a typical day at The School. Our reaction is instant, violent, and practiced. A storm of outgoing ammunition as we all fire into the space we''re sure was ahead of us. Emptying what little we have left.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 0/220 Spare Mags :: 2/4
Then, our weapons become clubs - and we go absolutely wild. Swiping claws and buttstocks wild abandon. Trusting our helmets and padding to keep us safe as we wade into the melee. Gremlin a hyperactive blur of red, tearing through fairies - with no effect at all. Demon a snarling, rampaging monster. Kami a brutal pit-fighter, tossing out straight shots that nearly knock my head in. And me? I leap right into the fray. My ears battered by such frenzy and distortion until I cannot tell malfunction from illusion. Grabbing at shapes in the maddening light, and dashing drones into walls and each-other. Until our attacker makes a single, critical, mistake. A tiny fairy that descends, almost lovingly, to zing Kami''s iron elbow with a sparking wand. Instantly, the world goes supernova. A light so blazing hot and white it pierces all holos. Casting stark shadows that stream from every hidden drone at once. Especially the welder-bot sabotaging Kami. But not only that. It streaks long shadows from the spidery holo-projector drones clinging to the walls and ceiling. At least a dozen of them. I rip out my pistol, and take two before the flash is even half-way done. Spinning to knock out a third, right as it fails. The others are ain''t idle. Kami grabs the welder, and hammers its body into a fourth. Zipper leaping to snatch number five as Demon rams six. Tufty pounce-hugging seven, as Kami spins to hurl her crushed bot into one at the end. The perfect image falters. But holo-bots are a hiveMind. They instantly adapt, and reposition. "NICE BLOODY TRY!" I scream, pulling a flare from my suit and walloping its butt into the wall. Triggering an instant eruption of light that scours the holos from reality. Mop-up is fast. "So that''s why The School bloody banned flares!" Kami screams as she piston-punches a spider to death. Leaving us alone in a silent, still, and forgotten hallway. Deep in the abandoned heart of the QIZ. "Hmmmmm~sss!!! Flappiess tastiess all gone-gonessss!" Gremlin huffs, poking at pile of scrap in a hopeful sort of way. Her scaly tail lashing fretfully. "Least someone''s bloody enjoying herself." Our sniper drawls, eyeballing a grinning Zip and a red-faced Tufty - both clutching very unhappy holo-bots. "Mate! Quick! Plug me in! Like, right now! We gotta hack em!" There is a sudden, stunned, instant of realisation. And then my teeth rip wide in a savage grin. "HELL YEAH!! Take the bloody bot, we could take the whole bloody army!" I cheer as a vibrant roar of hope and energy slams through my veins. "Let''s get secure, first! Down there! Let''s go!" Quick as thought, I lock home a brand-new mag. Demon scooping a fighty Gremlin, and we kick our way through the scrap and bodies of rats. My flare held high, like a blazing sword, to ward off all illusions.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 220/220 Spare Mags :: 1/4
Our caution turns out to be bloody warranted when one entire walls turns transparent in the burning light. An entire squad of collared rat-slaves staring at us with shock as we pierce the veil of their camouflage. And I''m quite sure who''s more shocked - us, or them. "Fast and hard!" I yell as Demon headbutts them with the force of a cannon-shot, breaking the line in a single move and tumbling them into a tangle of limbs. Furry bodies tangling with almost-human as they get lodged together in that tight little hall to the toilets. Only one escapes, and Gremlin hits him square in the face. Latching on like the bastard child of a man-trap and a monstrous, giggly, red limpet. The rest of us diving back as wild rocket-fire spews past our faces, and the guy tumbles over backward. "Pivot and run!" I roar, and we blitz past in a whirl. Twisting half the group to run backward as the rest lead us to safety. Guns on every window as we make the final, mad, dash for the executive conference-room right at the end of the hall. This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience. Plunging inside, and slamming the thick, frosted glass, door. Demon immediately charges to work as we hold it. Shouldering the entire, ten-person, table and rams it into the door. With Badger surfing it, no less. The kid hops down to shove in wheelie chairs, as Kami hurls a wine-dispenser on top - old red leaking from it like septic blood. The rest of us scrambling to find literally anything else we can in the spartan space. Which is when Badger casually leans in to click the locking mechanism, with a proud "There!". Activating a series of hardened tungsten bars that seal the door perfectly shut. Kami proceeds to bonk his noggin. "Well. This is going bloody well." I chuckle, madly, as bullets impact the outside. "Zip! How''s the drone?" "Ready, mate! But it''s still trying to, like, uh-" He yelps as the spider makes a leggy bid for freedom. Tufty clinging to his own as it drags him across the floor. His green kitty ears prodded by furious, flickering, fairies while an imaginary wizard pulls an equally imaginary elbow-drop. Beating at his arms with fruitless, ghostly, fingers. Kami glares at the skidding cat, moving to help Zipper instead. Her hard metal hand tugging a neuroLink cable free of his gear, which she ''gently'' plugs it into the side of his skull. Then, they work together. Jimmying the spider''s caprice jam the other end into a maintenance slot. Zipper''s head jerks back, and both he and the bot go suddenly rigid. Distortion building around us as the air is scarred by glitching images. With roaring static and titanic cogs that rip through the stuff of reality. Unfurling terrible wings of iron and glitching granite, strewn with hundreds of blackened metal eyes. All twisted and shrieking and weaving around him. Yet smoother than ever before. And there - unseen by all, but me - Polybius pours its darkness and eldritch machinery down the cable. Consuming the drone in a morass of living chaos that reaches its flailing tendrils out, and out to snare the devices controlling it. I step back. Taking a second to find my breath. "Stabilising neuroLink." States our unsettling AI. "Est-" Gremlin blasts off the floor in a leap of panic as something goes BANG-BADA-BANG! BANG! beneath us. Rattling a shiver of dust from above. Tufty lands on the table a moment later. Wibbling hopelessly and tweaking his frizzed up tail. And everything goes still. The holoBots frozen stiff, mid escape, as a faint haze of whimsy and frolicking fairies jerk and repeat above them. Then, as one, all their illusions implode like smoke sucked back into a bottle. A tiny swarm of holo-projector beads dropping from the air around them to rattle and bounce on the floor. Slowly, Zipper reaches up to rip out the cable. His face a mask of fractured, free-floating, eyes in a sea of too-bright light. Blinking, unsteadily, as they all turn to me. "What the shittin'' Hell was that???" I yell, turning on the spot. "Our Connection was severed." The Machine Mind states, without a trace of humanity. "Severed-!?" Kami gestures widely. "They blew their uplink?" "Yes." It concludes, as strange flickers of clockwork bleed through my ammo-counter. "Along with their entire Drone Control Hub. Killing their [Drone Commander], and all subordinates." "Holy shit, mate." Zip says says as distortions shimmer around his head. "They could''ve, y''know, like, bust up the kit! Or run away! Or, like, anything!" "Unless they considered the operators disposable." Kami nods. "That sounded like a bunch of bangs, strung together. Like multiple small bombs." "Slaves." I hiss. "It''s all slaves. ''Owned'' by bloody Wayman." I give a slow shake of my head. "They didn''t care. They just.... didn''t.... care." "Oh, they did care." Kami says, darkly. "They cared a lot about their systems. About you using their army against them. Just not about the people running that system." "So, what, like, blow them up....??" Zip says. It''s not really a question. And he''s not really asking. "Hacker AIs are fast as Hell." I explain anyway. Because I feel like someone has to. "War slaves are slow, scared, n'' terrified of gettin'' shit wrong. You order em to smash up their own gear, it''s ninety-nine to one they''ll panic. They''ll dither. Ask to confirm. Think it''s a false order from some hacker...." "But, like, seriously.... To just....." "That''s Wayman. Ruthless as Hell." I pace. Tail lashing. Growling like a predator. "A few seconds delay, and we''d be all up in their systems. Hell, they saw us bloody do it with the train! We''d grab the signal keys for their drones, minimum. And then their army is our army. So what do they do?" My claws dig tight into bandaged palms. Tight enough to cut. "What do they do?" "Humans tossed away like garbage." Kami whispers, darkly. "Sound like anyone else we know?" "Yeah." I breathe. "Sounds like the assholes we''re runnin'' from." I stop. I shudder. I snarl. "Polybius! Tell me ya got somethin''! A map! A damned picture! Anything! Cause I''m about ready to bloody avenge some poor bastards we ain''t never even....." I turn away, closing my eyes to contain the rage inside. Polybius ticks for a moment, then its voice fills the air. "The explosive trigger was almost instant. There was very little that could be retrieved." "Nothing??" "No." Says the emotionless cauldron of boiling eyes and wings shimmering above my gun. "However. I have obtained the positions and types of their drone army. Also. I have determined that their systems are neoSoviet technology. Which indicates a possible link to The School." A low breath gets sucked out of the room. Not of shock, but of pain and forced acceptance. "I was right." "Hope not. They''ll bloody report this. Our Evil Bitch of a Stepmother will know we''re here." Kami warns, after a moment. My eyes darken. "Not if none of em make it." I glance around at them all - these kids I gotta protect. "Not if they don''t check in. Not if every damn person they''ve mind-raped and bloody tortured gets Justice tonight." "Long way back to The People''s Empire." Kami agrees, six hands working seamlessly to check her guns. "Hard to get a signal out that far East. Even on the Neodine Trunk Lines." "Which means," My breath hisses silken death through bared fangs. "It ain''t gone through yet. Which means our target is still in the buildin''." The Left Hand of the Devil. Or part of it. "Yeah, maybe mate. Unless their drone drop was, like, yesterday." "Either way. This was a timed op. This was never a reward." Kami spits with all due venom. "This was the real target." A flash blasts across the ''glass'' door, blackening it. "Grenade. Shit. They''re gettin'' spicy out there." "Maybe. Probably." I hiss as my ears slip left and right. Hunting odd sounds in the walls. "But that don''t matter now. Not after what we''ve seen. No." I rip open my wet eyes, and there is only fury. "All their drones are down! That''s why it''s so pathetic out there right now!" My grin widens. "They got nothin''." "Well, like, not nothing." Zip stutters, yanking the cable from his skull. "They got turrets. Rat slaves, too. They gotta be different systems." "And big mean ole goons!" Badger pipes, trying to be helpful. Probably. Kami scoffs. "If they had goons, they wouldn''t need Waymans'' scraps. They''d be kicking the door in right now." "Yep." I hiss, with malicious vengeance. "They''re down to dust n'' pocket lint. And I got a nasty little plan to turn the tide...." Kami''s glitched eyes shine white as opals in the dark. Metallic, and eerie. A dark little grin glittering beneath the chaos of her broken face. "Oh my. Do tell." "Best not. Walls got ears." I warn. "Pol. Any more data?" "No." "Shit. We''re runnin'' round with our asses on fire" I maul at my helmet, biting sharp fangs together. "What about our other ''source''. The dataStick. From our ''informant''." I avoid saying ''Moon''. "Anythin'' we can use? We must have something." "Doubt it. It''s all just garbage off the company website. Business was called ''FabTek'' a zillion years ago. Big contractor for the ''Grand Revival of New Quebec''. Specialised in ''industrial drones'', and random custom jobs." Kami repeats, reeling off the cliff notes from our briefing. "That''s it. Except some glossy images, but Polybius thinks they''re stock photos." "Garbage. Yeah. Nothing new." I muse. The go rigid. "Wait. Website?" "Yeah. Pol confirmed. It''s on a half-broke server on the old web....." She tails off. "If this place is outta comms range." I reason, quietly. "How did our bloody ''informant'' look at the website?" That knocks us back. "Forget it. We''re wasting time." Kami snaps. "For all we know, they have breaching charges. Or bigger bombs." "Right!" I snap straight up. "Let''s go." "Go?" Says a whimsically girly little voice. "Oh my goodness! But you''ve only just arrived!" "Who-" Kami starts. And then the entire back wall of the meeting room is ripped clean apart. Revealing a nightmarish, beautiful, neonPunk apocalypse of light. Of blinding colours, and sugar-coated nightmares. All gleaming with beauty, and wicked sharp teeth. And at their midst. Crowned in glory, with and actual tiara.. A face I never thought I''d see again. >><< >> Little Miss Sunshine >> Little Miss Sunshine Granite screams and metal snaps as the walls are torn away by things from mad, drugged, dreams and evil fairytales. Foxes, and, fawns. Naiads and dryads. Fairies and dwaries, and things you can''t name. All roaring and screaming and pouring from every broken hole and hollow. Ripping out great, heavy, chunks of masonry with tiny golden fingers. Shattering our still-burning flare. Forcing us back. Forcing us down. Forcing us under the table, as slabs of ceiling turn to headsman''s axes that shatter against the floor. The rest simply.... removed by some vadt, mechanical, force disguised as thousands of fey litrle hands. The sheer, freaking, NOISE of three entire walls being utterly removed smacks my GMO ears like bricks Numbing me. Shaking me. It''s pure Shock And Awe. The utter force of it pressing down upon us with the weight of some laughing god. Breaking minds with its power. Breaking reality itself as our world is eaten away by creatures of colour and darkness that burn through the gaps of our fingers. Unveiling a vast portal to some world of pretend that does not, and cannot, exist. And from it, unrolls a tongue of ruby red cartoon carpet. A thing of gentle curves and twists and winding ways that Impacts the floor like a mortar shell. Rupturing it into bits and dust that rattle off the faceplate of my helmet. A single, pretty, foot descends from it. Fluttering with ribbons and glittering lights. And there she is. That ''Friend From School'' you pray you''ll never see again. That ''Friend'' that puts cold ice up your back with every little smile. That ''Friend'' who never seems to die. The original leader of our team. She descends upon us with gentle, delicate, butterfly wings fluttering against her back. A fairy princess in a pretty pink gown - all done up in sequins, and bows with fanciful knots. With her hair in just the most beautiful braids. Flitting, so fancifully, as she reaches out to trail us with glitter from her glittery make-believe wand. Ending it all with a bratty little batt of her lashes. And a smile, so bright - like we''re All Good Pals - as her cheery little voice rips right through my brain. Cutting it in half with a rancid, childish, phrase we all dread and remember. Oooh! Lookie-lookie-loo! I found all of yooou!!!!! The Fairy Princess cheers, as her court toot horns and trumpets. "Hello everybuddy! Gosh! Our Lovely Stepmummy is going to be EVER soooooo Happy that I''ve found yooooou!!!" No. I whisper, clambering from under the cracked table. "No! Youre bloody dead.!" Dead and gone. Dead and devoured by the things in the dark. But the tiny little girl twists her tiny little head, like a doll that came alive. Fixing me with such a warm smirk. "Oh? Am I?" She scoffs, with pretty hands on narrow hips. "Well! That''s a berry nasty-mean thing to say to your Bestest BESTEST ever Friend in the whole wide world!!" She giggles with genuine glee that soon turns acidic and insane. "Especially after you MURDERED ME!" My mind skids to a stop. Utterly derailed. Exactly as she intended. "Murdered.....? What!? No, we-" I jolt out as Demon''s teeth flash sharp and bloodied in the undulating light. A light that twists reality. That twists what happened. That remakes our world. Transforming fallen stones to moss and toadstools. Chairs into hillocks, and tables into mossy bowers. Killers to victims. Victims to monsters. "Oh yes!" The Fairy Princess insinuates, quite cheerfully, as something very broken gleams at me from deep inside her thick-lashed eyes. "Or did you want to Play Pretend?" "Pretend.....!??" I whisper, choking on the word. But then my mind catches up to memory. To the moment. To the threat above me, and I snarl with bloodied rage. "Mate! Don''t-" Zip yells. "You''re lyin'' piece of bloody work!" I hiss in the face of unknown threat and whirling illusion. Ignoring the broken room around me. "Why thank you, kindly." The mad girl curtsies as I prowl beneath her. Finding no fault in the luminescent image. No glitch to see through. No hint of the true threat beyond. "And, you know..... I''ll even forgive you. Isn''t that nice of me? I forgive you. Even though you''re all liars who pretend you aren''t murderers! Even though you KILLED ME!!" "Y''think this is bloody School??" I snap my tail out, shifting my weight. Using the moment of distraction to build a picture, painted in touch, of the hidden masonry scattering the floor. "That you''re some bloody Teacher? Rewriting Reality?" Her smile is dazzling, and bright, and quite unhinged. "Oh, Spookie. Didn''t you hear?" She says as the glittering star of her wand twitches suddenly toward my implant. "I Graduated." I twist away from her, and it skims past my eye. "Don''t you-!" I scream, hand almost snapping to the single remaining flare on my belt. No. I can''t. If I just shut off her illusions, ''playtime'' stops. Which means we gotta counter-strike, attack, knock out her illusions, and counter her big ''surprise'' all at once. Without communicating. Without even knowing what she''s got. But what if.....? I see her eyes shift to the flare, ever so slightly, and I know it just became bait.The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. Which means...... I duck to one side, and snap a glance to Zip - then upward. Flickering a gesture as she streams in on me again. Sparking like a rocket. Laughing, wildly, as she thinks we''re in her power. That she has played us so totally that we''ve just bloody accepted it. That we''re spinning our wheels, and panicking inside. Hoping a solution will come rushing in to save us. Rather than the reality that I now know who I''m dealing with. How they think. And how they fail to. The wand snakes the other way. A burning trail of light, streaking for my head. Seeking my implant, and therefore my brain. Left, then right. Stabbing out a staccato. Forcing me back, into a snarling crouch. One hand on the floor. Tail a lashing curve above me. "You ain''t gettin'' in our bloody heads again!" I scream, as the tip skims up from the floor in a rush of gold. Dodging her mayhem again and again. "You ain''t controlin'' us!" I leap on the table, and the girl''s smile is radiant. Wild. And ever so bright. The wand''s tip stabbing cracks in the concrete, where I stood. "Oh, aren''t you oh-so silly! We''re just playing a game!" The fey devil sings with delight from the shadow-pink heart of that cartoon supernova. Spinning a dervish that sends me tumbling over the shards and scree. "NO." I bellow in the voice I know used to scare her. The holo faltering, if only for an instant. "YOU AIN''T GONNA PISS ABOUT WITH OUR MEMORIES!!!" I take a long, choking, breath. "We''ve bloody locked you out, y''little BITCH!" The wand dips. Dangling, carelessly, from two fingers as she shrugs. "Honestly, Spookie! I muss your hair and you accuse me of brainwashing you!! You really are quite.... hmm! Mad!" I trade a flicker of a glance with Zip, who nods slowly. Several of his bees bleeding off into the chaos of illusions. Keep her talking. Got it. "And you''re a dumb dead bitch." I hiss, skittering away on all fours. "Which means I''m talkin'' to a bloody fake-ass Simulant. An AI ghost." "A Sim?" Princess titters, regally. "Is that what you think this is?" "She always was a massive fraud." Our [Sniper] lets out, in a hard burst of cold laughter, hammering Badger free of the concrete wedging him under the table. "Fake Princess. Fake face. Fake Leader." Her eyes turn nasty. "Now she''s Fake Alive, too." "The ultimate Fake Friend." I deadpan. "Nailed it." Kami chuckles as the holo-fairy glowers, slamming dented metal hands together. "Shit. She only turned out a [Sniper] to fake being me." I meet Kami''s eyes, and nod. Demon palming something into his hand. Princess flickers a gaze of contempt across our ragged little army, and then her nails. "Yet here I am. Realer than any of you, I''d say." She smiles suddenly, and cheekily. "Perhaps you''re the not-real ones. Did you think about that?" "Only real thing in here is us, and whatever did this....." I snarl at the hole still sizzling in the floor. Scraping it out with the leathery tip of a toe. And trying very hard not to look at Zipper. To even think about him. His new holo-spiders are gone. His bees evaporated. Has Fake Princess noticed? She never was bloody observant. But, then again, this thing ain''t her - no matter what it says. It''s just really, really, good at faking. If we''re lucky, it might be too good. AI Sims can be weird like that. It could see, and hear, and know everything we do. Know, even, what we''re going to do next. But then utterly ignore it all because the real Princess wouldn''t. That''s the gamble. It''s playing a character. A role. But can it stop? Only one bloody way to find out. Kami crashes her massive rifle down on the cracked table, and unfolds it. Slotting the massive barrel onto the base. Massive, chunky, rocket-bullets rolling down her wrists to be grabbed and slotted into the rotary magazine. "You''re going to try and Murder me again? Aren''t you?" Princess sultrs as reality is ripped apart by mad illusions. By rising hordes of centaur, and living Toys. Their heads looming high and violent above us. Yes. Keep looking at me. At Kami. "You''re nothing but digital ghost. A copy." Our [Sniper] states, not even looking her way. "And it wasn''t bloody murder to begin with. The real Princess would know that." "Oh. It was. You Murdered me, gladly. You threw me away." Something icy and unjolly enters the pink fairy''s tone. Wings lilting slowly. Delicately. As if fidgeting in rage. "But now I''m all better! Now I''m quite fine! A Princess once more, and all do declare! No prettier a princess shall ever there be!" Kami''s hands stumble. A cough of dry laughter in her throat. "I am pretty! Aren''t I?" The Fake Fairy Princess concludes, as her eyes turn ever more coy and vicious. Her tone dipping ever more toward danger. "You can say so, you know? I shan''t be mad." "Pretty?" Kami says, very softy, lifting her weapon at last. "You''ve always been an ugly, petty, vain, little bitch...... Inside. Outside. All over, really." She clicks it home as the very air around Princess begins to darken. Her fairies turning spiky. "But pretty? I''d never accuse you of that." The Fairy Princess tilts her head with a tight, angry, little ''Hmm.'' And then she raises a slow, calm, finger towards our [Sniper] and screams "OFF WITH HER HEAD!" "KAMI!!" I roar, and our [Sniper]''s eyes flash wide. Her body slamming to the floor as the wall behind her explodes like it was hit by a tank. Ricocheting fist-size chunks of rubble off her back and helmet. Burying her in dust and bits, as Badger ducks back under the table. The whole thing over in half an echoing instant of violence. And, for half that instant, I think Kami might be dead. Panic forcing me forward, on jittering legs, a Ind rush to Kami''s side. Stealth-orbs sparking and dead on her back. Her arms splayed out like the dead grip of a metal spider. "Oh my." Titters the sparkly pre-queen, behind me, as a shimmering fairy executioner rips his axe free of the wall. Rotating on too small wings to stare down at us all. "Did oooo have a widdle tumble? Did ooo bang ooo''s knee?" "Kami....." I whisper again, as if frightened to wake her. My clawed fingers plucking at the air above - never touching her actual body. Because they can''t. And I falter at the actual hurt in her eyes. "You ok-?" "Shut it. Idiot. That should be long enough." She hisses. "Go." I nod, and then stand. Slowly. Avoiding Badger''s huge scared eyes peeping out at me. His over-large hand gripping the inner struts of the table. My heart cracked by utterly apocalyptic Rage. That singular blow could have killed two of my team. One a friend. One my little brother. I flick a claw from Demon to them as I turn, one last time. Facing off against the poisonous Princess and her sickly-sweet court. "Okay-bloody-dokie." I whisper in a low, and threatening, tone. Princess touches a pale, silky, glove to her spitefully-bitten little lip. "Is something wrong?" "Yeah. You." I hiss. "But I''m gonna fix that. Now. And forever." And I reach for my belt. For the one weapon I know will shatter all of her illusions. A weapon that isn''t there. Just as predicted. I widen my eyes, and hope it''s convincing. "SPOOK! ALL OUR FLARES ARE GONE!" Kami chokes, as if on cue. Right as Demon hauls her upright. Slapping at her armour, and his. Panicked in their search. And there is Princess, above. Touching her lip, as if holding back mirth, even as her mad laughter rings. I touch the spot on my armour, but there''s nothing at all. No flares. No grenades. She took the bait! "YOU!" Kami breathes, hauling herself upright to face the illusion. Which puts on a twee impression of false innocence. "You came all this way to Play With Me! And here I am!" Whispers that sweet voice of doom, echoing from everywhere except the girl in front of me. Her lips twitching wide - not in a smile, but something darker. Less human. "....but did you bring your Toys?" "YOU BLOODY THIEF! YOU ALWAYS DO THIS!" Kami staggers forward. "EVERYTHING I HAVE! EVERYTHING! YOU TAKE FROM ME! MY FRIENDS! MY STUFF! MY-" "-oh my. Reverting to type, are we?" The Fairy Princess twists her sharp lips. "Always trying to pin things on me. Your little scapegoat? One never knows who could steal from you..... Maybe it was your precious little kitty....?" But her visage falters as she sees the spiky smirk ripping wide across my mouth. "Oh yeah. We brought em alright." "Wait." She frowns. "This wasn''t your real plan? Wasn''t it??" "ZIPPER! MARK TARGETS!" I scream in absolute triumph and joy. "KAMI! OPEN FIRE!" And then, with barely a breath I add. "BADGER!!! REMOTE DETONATE THE FLARES!!" And, you know, Princess''s face is the prettiest picture of shock in all the world as Kami lifts her massive gun. A storm of static erupting above as Zipper''s bees designate her hidden projectors as targets on our Augmented Reality overlay. Which is just as well, because military flares burn utterly, eye-scalding, bright. Killing our vision - but killing her cameras too. Darkening the world to one of scent, and sound. A world GMOs are all too happy to work in. "Always too bloody focused on ya own tricks." I chuckle, as the hidden network of projectors above die in an explosive roar. Kami firing off shot after shot with her eyes clenched shut. Focused, only, on the targets Zipper printed on her vison. I raise my arms, like a conductor, as I hear the gantries scream and fall. Princess and her entire fairy court evaporating like mist on the wind. Revealing the hard-lit shadow of something much, much, much worse. >>><<< >> The Bad Kind of Friend >> The Bad Kind of Friend I hurl myself into a painful, sideways, roll as something massive in the smoke puts an actual crater where I was. Its form boiled to nothing by our colour-coded supernova. A neon ring of spitting magnesium that roars from every one of our high-powered flares. All Princess had to do stop this was put them out of reach. To shove them in a backroom. A hole. Instead, she dropped them right out in the rubble. Hiding them with illusions, for her own amusement. So we''d walk past them, unknowing. So she could pluck them up and dangle them in front of us. That''s just the kind of ''friend'' she is. And just how I remember her, too. Short sighted. Sadistic. Terrible aim. It makes her predictable. My body jerks into another roll, but I needn''t have. The monstrous thing in the blinding, shadow-dancing, void of dust and light cannot see us. Its fury directed at random. At nothing. At where we might have been, or could have been. Quaking the ground with every slamming, thrashing, strike. The air filled with chips of rock, and eye-scarring light. And screaming, impotent, rage. I see only in flashes. Stumbling. Tumbling. Grabbing up one of Demon''s gold-tinted flares, and over the scree. Through a hole in the floor to land on virtually clear tiles. Demon himself lands beside me. A Zipper-blue flare in one hand, Tufty under the other as Kami scrambles in behind. Herding Badger, and Gremlin - who whimpers horribly. Hiding her large red eyes, and thrashing her long scaly tail. "SPOOKIESS!!!!!" "I know it''s bright!! I bloody know! Just deal with it!" The world rumbles, and I realise I''ve made a critical error. Up there, we were shielded by a wall of light. Down here? We''re picked out as a target. Like I did with the Hellcrawler. And I''m yelling. Beyond the rage of light, reflected in the windows, something truly massive lets out a roar from the age of the first apocalypse. A thundering sound more horn and horror than actual noise. And a symphony of tiny, cheerful, bells in the dark. It lumps a heavy step. And then another. Tinkling all the way. "Spook?" Zipper says in a tiny voice. "Maaaate?" "RUN!" I slap the flare to my armour, and we hare away on all fours. A tunnel of frosty glass wrapping the edge of - I assume - a balcony. Its surface sparking odd shades of blue and yellow as our spitting lights shift. But what''s beyond it? A sharp drop? A factory floor? I shudder. Eyes widening. Images of something tearing down the wall. Collapsing the floor beneath me. Tipping me out into an unknown drop- "Spook! We gotta shut these off!" Kami yells, shaking me out of it. "We can''t! Suit lights won''t cut it!" I snarl back. "It''s all cameras along here anyway! She knows where we are!" Her eyes darken. Dancing with real fire. "Blow the power?" "Can we find it?" I counter. She scowls. "If the blueprints weren''t bullshit-" Everything shudders violently beneath us, my claws clashing for grip on the tile as the windows rattle dust from the walls. My stuttering, failing, eyes jerking to glass that dances with brilliant colour. Clouds dust, behind us, scarred by wild and clashing colours.This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. And, in them, Princess flickers. Malevolent, and smiling. Her eyes furious, and wicked, and terrible to behold. Yet barely visible in the violently too-bright light. "If you don''t Play Fair, I''m Telling Mummy!" Her head rocks, like a broke-necked doll. "She''ll Make You Sorry you ever Ran Away! And then I''ll make what''s left into Happy Little Dollies!" Her breath shudders out, her mouth almost frothing. "And then we''ll ALL be Best, Best, Friends!! FOREVER!" "Oh, yeah, very sane." Kami snarks. Trying to undermine her. "Yes." She giggles. "And then you''ll do everything I say! Just like besties are supposed to!" "Friends. Oh yeah. " I whisper. "Y''think I''d even pretend to be your friend? After what you did to us? You did shit to us that even Aristos would vomit at!" But Princess doesn''t even blink. Her smile sharper than ever before. "I didn''t say you could say no." And the floor rattles again. Closer. Closer still. "C''mon." I snarl, and we fly past rooms that flicker and go dark. Leaving only Princess within. And her terrible smile. Ahead, we have two choices. Hit the hallway breaking right, or blow past it. But if we do, that''s it. We''re stuck on a straight road to a hard left at the end. Which means looping the monster. Which means we''re in deep shit. And if it hits us on that corner, we''ll be absolute paste. Tufty screams as safety glass blasts inward behind us. Windows blowing inward as our unseen nightmare rips the balcony apart. Nightmare.....? The ''dj vu'' hits so hard I actually stumble. My mind flashing back to that darkened chase along the storm-soaked road, open on one side to oblivion. Crowded, on the other, by doors and false exits. All the while hunted by a laughing monster that cannot be touched. A demon who locks off escape. Who shuts off the lights. Who drives us on, and on. Who goads us with escape, and uses it to trap us. "Look at what''s happenin''! It''s MOON!" I scream. "Either she''s bloody Moon in disguise, or-" "-THE LITTLE BITCH WAS STALKING US!" Kami roars in realisation, as the smug ghost of Princess shimmers ahead. "THAT''S HOW WAYMAN BLOODY FOUND US IN THE TOWER! THAT''S WHY THEY''RE HERE!!!" Her face snaps to me. "SHE''S BEEN TRACKING US THE WHOLE TIME!" "Holy shit!" My mind blanks, for half an instant. Pieces fitting together all too fast. But that exit is right in our faces, and I gotta decide. What would Princess do? Images flicker. Memories. But too slow. No! Can''t risk it! "IGNORE THE TURN! IT''S A TRAP!!" I scream, and we hurl ourselves past it in a rush. The passage erupting in an infernal ROAR of flame that rolls its wash of fire and smoke across the windows. Not an explosion. Not a bomb. A scream of actual flamethrowers, singeing the tips of our tails. And all the time the monster comes. Punching through window, after window, after window. Faster than anything real. I catch an almost-glance as it reaches into the still-spewing fire. A fat hand the size of all your worst dream, all coated in flame-fuel as it snatches at the ground. Uncaring. Demented. And eager. Covering its unseen body in fire. And then it drags its massive, MASSIVE, arm through the glass wall behind us. Faster and faster. Too fast. Right behind us as we hammer into the turn. Shrinking the gap as we kick off the corner. Half leaving Kami behind. I focus on the path. Ears twisting from front to back as I calculate distance, and hunt the next danger. Proxy mines? Turrets? Something new? Depends if she needs us alive, dead, driven someplace, or she''s just trying to torture us and doesn''t really care. The tactical difference is massive, and could change her entire strategy. Another junction. Another passage. And a sudden intake of giddy breath behind us. As if Princess is up on her toes, waiting to see what we do. And my mind flashes through her psycho calculations. It won''t be flames - twice is boring. It won''t be rats - she''s running out. And all her drones are supposedly dead. Bomb is too quick - no time to gloat. But what she really, really, would enjoy is making us run right past our only escape. That would keep her up all night in giggles and hysterics if she pulled it off. And so, right as we hit the passage, I scream "STOP!" The other panicking as the massive, still burning, ''hand'' implodes the windows behind us. Ripping through the one we literally just past. But I feel an almost zen as I duck a quick flare-lit look down the hole. Kami and Demon skidding my heels as they try to shove me past. But then I grin. "IN! IN! GO! NOW!!!" Cubes of glass explode against my back as we do. Bowling, and tumbling, and crying in horror as the burning fist of a monstrous god hammers past us. Ripping windows and railings from their fames, and casting them down into Hell. And then, it turns. A huge, white-toothed smile, stretching its face. Splitting at the seams at it tears open to reveal a vast plushy mouth lined with stabbing, serrated, saw-blade teeth. And a throat wide enough to swallow a freaking adult, whole. Smoke and embers boil on its bright, polka-dotted, costume. Sizzling gently as rag-doll clown rattles its massive, overstuffed, head side-to side. Jangling a thousand merry little bells as it beams at us with demented, children''s-TV, eyes. "Oh my God." Kami whispers. "It''s a Plaything." And then it curls one great, squishy, paw of a fist. Flames melting the tight, cracked, fabric as it fires toward us like a ball from a cannon. And it hits like one. Like solid steel wrapped in fluff, as it crashes down on our little hallway. Its huge arms stretching hideously as they slamming through walls, through desks, through offices and pillars. Shattering the windows into a billion glittering cubes. "RUN!!" I scream, but I can''t even hear the words as those arms curve like plushie snakes. Smashing through the sides of our passage, and covering us with glass. Wrapping the walls and strut around us, in a hug that crushes them inward. Trapping us. Tumbling the ceiling. Breaking the building apart. >>><<< >> When All Your Friends Are Gone .... Who Is Left? >> When All Your Friends Are Gone .... Who Is Left? The whole structure of the hallway crimps abruptly inward, raining crystalline cubes of glitching glass that turn clear and perfect as they tink off my helmet. The huge, comical, arms constricting and breaking until the metal SCREAMS. And only way out is down. To duck. To crawl. To push Badger ahead of you, on a raft of tiny cubes. "GO! GO!" I scream. "KAMI! DEMON! GET EM OUT!" "Wait! WAIT! Spook! I can help!" He yells, flipping crude buttons and switches stuck all over his armour. A flicker of light interrupted by dozens of components shorting in a cascade of sparks that send him yelping. "JUST GO! GO!" I roar. Rolling out of the mash of crushing steel. The clown ripping free the struts that held the ceiling. I leap ahead, spraying gemlike cubes from my feet as we skitter and stumble. Kami turning to fire as the building collapses around us. More enemies, or illusions, sifting in the chaos. My eyes tracking- Tile and glass skid beneath me, and I fall. My skull is slammed into concrete, with a crack that explodes my vision with glitches and static. With errors that garble off into gibberish as even my core systems fail. Shutting down everything. My sight. My hearing. All of it. Everything goes silent and inky. My HUD is gone. The errors. Everything. My world shrinking to touch, and smell, and instinct. All of which scream at me to move as something unseen, unheard, but yet expected crashes towards my back. I roll to one side, and wind splashes across me. A hand the size of any two of us crashing directly into the spot where I lay. Dragging through cubes of silent glass as the arm retracts into the body. An ''Implant Restarting'' warning blips my empty vison, hope flaring as-
### batt eTk S˧tem S f Dign?tic: [ERR? r] ### ## CRTICL SS?EM FˡLURE
-it fails. And the darkness crawls back to eat me alive. I snarl in the violent silence. Feeling my throat thrum as I roll again, banging into legs and arms that pull me upward. Demon, by the smell of him. Zipper too. "GO!" I try to scream "GO!" I hear nothing. Nothing at all. But maybe they did. Or maybe an attack by a demented, fever-dream, clown-monster is all the prompting anyone needs. Either way, they drag me up - into a run. One step. Two step. Stumble. My vision fluttering with warnings. And then I feel that freaking psycho-circus monstrosity snag my entire head and torso between two gigantic, clown-glove, fingers. My legs thrashing air, in silence, as it hauls me directly out of their grip. Dragging me away, towards that unseen pit. Screaming. Without words. Without voice. Demon''s clawed fingers hook onto my ankle. My blind eyes staring into nothing as the monstrous clown rips his feet from the floor. Dangling his massive weight from one of my legs. Swinging him, and me, as it raises us up and up. In the silent nothingness. It could almost be a dream. I feel so utterly disconnected. Until Demon''s granite-strong fingers dig deep into mine, and I haul him up as fast as I can. His weight twisting me sideways as our claws slash endless tracks in squashy, but strong, material. My breath aching out in hisses and spurts as I try, and try, to wriggle myself free. And not to think about the roar of air rushing through my fingers and toes. Or what might be so very far beneath me. My eyes reboot, at last, right in time to see the other hand hammer Demon clear off of me. A huge, sheer, cliff of pale glass replacing his horrified face. A cliff that stretches up, and up, and up, through the core of the tower. A thousand balconies, stacked like a Badgery sandwich. My guts recoil inside me, tight as can be, as The Clown''s too-long arm stretches up. And up. And up. Teetering its way to an utterly impossible height. The wrist turns, and I see my death before me. A dizzying pit built from layer upon layer of factories, offices, and drone-works. Too far to even think of grappling. I would swing against the wall. And I would burst. I scream like a child as the fingers slip around me. The distant floor a hard, red, wash of painted concrete. Of jagged machines. Broken gantries. And rebar-spiked rubble peaked by two curly, fat, clown shoes with big happy bells. Princess steps between them. Grinning up at me. Waving. And then she''s suddenly beside me. "No....." I plead. "No, no, no, no-!" And every nightmare copy of Princess laughs, and laughs, and laughs.The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. "Ooopsie! Your flare is all covered up! Oh, isn''t that a silly thing!" She trills - suddenly solid, and sparkly, once more. "Say! How long do those last? Just curious." "Stop! Please! Please-" "Ooooh! Silly old me! I forgot you''re a teensie eeencie bit afraid of heights! Double oopsie!" She pats her own head. "What a Silly Little Girl I am!" The world turns upside-down, and her hideously cutie-pie face turns with it. "Princess. Stop. If you- I''ll-" I plead, in a blood-eyed threat as the blood pours into my skull. The gigantic fingers pinching so hard my armour cracks and creaks. My lungs pressed tight to almost breathless nothingness. The Fairy Princess taps her wand to her mouth, once, twice. A vicious little smirk touching spitefully perfect little lips. "You know." She says, in a very thoughtful tone. "If you''re SUCH a scaredie-scardie, I''d be a Very Bad Girl if I just left you hanging about! Wouldn''t I?" "Nnnnn-" "Oh what''s that?" She brightens, suddenly. "You think I should tell Mr Tickles to put you down?" "No-!!" I shriek. But her wand is a burning comet that smashes into the clown''s huge finger, causing it to spring away. My claws slashing out to grab it as the hand begins to loosen, one fat finger at a time. My own weight stealing my grip on the slick, claw-proof, fabric. "Oh! Ooopsie!" Princess giggles. And them I fall. And fall. Thoughts speed to panicked gibberish as the tunnel of windows blurs to hyperspace speed. The clown''s horrible, cheery, face torn wide open beneath me. Its throat a tunnel of foam teeth and baby-toy tongue. Which suddenly spikes with vicious, jutting, knives. And hooks. And rusted blades. And spinning saws. All whirling, and ripping, and rushing up to meet me. Ready to crush, and grind, and chew, and skewer me alive. Slipping me down, down, down its gullet. Into an even worse fate. I almost shut my eyes, but instinct grabs my mind with hideously sharp claws. Flipping my legs in mid-air as I tumble toward the plushie, jagged, mouth. Twisting my tail for balance as my splayed claws roar through the air. My grapple hits the snaking arm beside me, and the micro-reel begins to SCREAM. The thread-thin wire swinging me right into the massive limb. Shoulder-armour crashing against a wall of articulated metal buried beneath thin, yet stretchy, fabric. "Oh. This works too." Princess sighs in delight as I howl, and thrash, and dangle. And then, somewhere above, fabric tears. Grapple falling slack, as I tumble again. Face first. The mouth ten metrics ''above'' me. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six- My second grapple punches directly into its great, happy, eyeball - and I land by punching a kick through the other. My body slapping, hard, against the squashy stuff of its face. Sliding down the side of its comical nose to dangle one hand, and head, directly into its evil mouth. Which slams shut. I contort in whiplash panic, jolting myself up and away - right as the steel jaw impacts the upper lip with a cute little squeak. And a shink of bladed ''teeth'' sinking into hidden holsters. "Ooooh! So close!" Princess sighs. But not in disgust or disappointment. Oh no. In glee. Because she doesn''t want the game to stop. I take a long, shaken, breath. Shoving myself back up the monstrous face. "I. Will. KILL-!!" I hiss. But how? I''ve only got two paralysis grenades, and I wouldn''t bloody trust my implant to trigger em. I need- My hands stop. What if? But dare I let go? Quick as I can I shift the flare to my back, shut my eyes, and plunge a hand into the satchel stuck to my leg. Rummaging until- "YES!" A lump of Badger''s nastiest, grossest, most unidentifiable plastique melting itself into the seams. A wad of pure explosives salvaged from his grubby pockets. I claw it out, wad it, and slap it into the hole in the thing''s eye. Grabbing at my webbing to find- "Whatcha doin''?" The Fairy breathes, right by my ear. "Cans I hewlp?" I throw myself to one side, and a massive fist impact the thing''s face. A second hammering in, close behind, as I skitter up onto its head. The ground still four entire floors beneath me. Enough to splatter your head like salsa. "Oooh! Don''t ooo want me to hwelp?" Princess adds, as if she hadn''t just tried to kill me. "Maybe I just gotta hwelp harder!" "SHIT!" I leap into the air as another hand thunders its plastic skull. Skidding me down, and down, until I can hook in all four sets of razor claws. But Playthings are ever so soft. And warm. And cuddly. And full of knives that ram up through hidden slits to stab holes right though my armour. Punching the air out of my lungs, and ripping free a hand. Blood, hot and sticky, filling my suit as another slams my arm, shaking my grip. Another aimed at my leg. Another right past my eye, stabbing a burning notch in my right ear. My claws carving tracks as I force myself up and away. Almost losing a hand in the process. It hits my chest again, and I gotta arch my entire body to keep from dying. It still isn''t enough. Not with the massive, pillowy, hand swinging down upon me. Roaring with a Hellish, whistling, weight that sings of broken spines and snapping skulls. Even as the weight of my body threatens to peel me right off the clown. To kill me by falling. Just how Princess planned. Or simply squash and impale me on blades that tear through my spine. But I haven''t been idle. I haven''t been slow. My bloodied hand snaps free of my webbing, clutching a silvery metal stick. A detonator. I synch it to my gauntlet, and reel myself back to the eyes on my tether. Dodging an ever-more panicked Princess, who blanks out my world with dancing pixies. Too late. I shut my eyes, and punch my fist into the hole. Leaping back to swing loose on my tether. I land hard, shoulder first, on its massive hip. "It ain''t that high up. It ain''t that high-" "Oooh! Watch out!" Princess jeers with laughter, and I kick off again. The flesh of the thigh sprouting bullet-fast spears of steel behind me. The machine-filled floor a whirling blur. My frantic thumb slapping the quick-release, right as the Plaything tries to intercept my line. I tumble. My guts flailing harder than my arms. Landing, half a breath later, with a SMACK on top of a cable-choked machine of unknowable function. Every gasp stabbing ragged blades into my belly. Wounds aren''t deep, but not fun. And when the adrenaline dips out, it''s gonna really hurt. But this isn''t done. Not yet. My head snaps around, then up. And up. And up again as the gargantuan, spike-encrusted, head of Mister Tickles ratchets toward me with a thunk-a-thunk-a-thunk. Like the main turret of a tank from a long-ago war. Its smile..... is very sweet. And very big. One eye kicked inward, unto darkness and void. The other staring at me with a glowing love and tenderness it chills my heart. "HUR HUR HUR!" It screams in the tortured, pre-recorded, voice of a dying machine. "HUR HUR HUR!" I take a single, shaken, step back. The tough skin of my heel slipping over the cool, curved, edge of the machine as it leans its entire multi-story body down at me. Every movement mechanistic, and wrong. Like a gantry crane in terrible motion. "Think ya can take me? Plaything?" I whisper as the head jerks to one side, in a thunderous tilt. A titan of old considering a mortal. "HUR HUR HUR!" It rails again. "TICKLE TICKLE!!!" I grin. "As you bloody wish." I step backwards, off the machine, and drop. One finger stabbing a button of my wrist. For an instant, silence. And then its entire Goddamned head explodes like powder-white pi?ata. Showering me and my cover with fire, and cogs, and actual freaking sweets. A rainbow hail of colourfully metallic little twist, gleaming in flickers as they rattle off the machines. I breathe out. I lean back, picking one from my shoulder. Hard toffees. I bloody hate hard toffees. They stick all up in my fangs. Also, they''re probably poisoned. So there''s that. Slowly, I slide my head up. Mister Tickles stuck, and rigid, above. Its head exploded. Its one arm poised high above, as if caught in the act of snaking toward me. "KAMI!!!" I scream. "I''M CLEAR!! HIT IT AGAIN!!! IT''S BLOODY PRETENDIN''!" Nothing. Nothing at all. "KAMI!!!" Princess shimmers into being, reclining on a pristine white fairytale cloud. "Ho, hum." "Piss off!" I snarl, as my belly jabs pain at me. Ripping the flare off my back to ward her away. "Oh, sure thing. No problem." The faint Fairy rolls in her cloud, tracing the wicked little smile on her lips with a finger. "I suppose I shant warn you then. Toodles." And she''s gone. "Warn-!? What?" I jolt, slightly. Eyes flickering up to the still, and silent, mass of Mister Tickles. "KAMI! WHERE ARE YOU??? KILL THE BLOODY THING!!!" I look around. I look up. I stare at the burst-open hole in the side of the balcony. "Kami?" I whisper. "Hur hur hur." Replies the headless corpse of Mister Tickles. >>><<< >> The Princess And The Cat >> The Princess And The Cat Smoke pours down the frosted glass of the balconies above, and I can''t even tell if it''s real. The machines crowding in around me as enormous mechanical hands grope the paths and cracks between them. The shattered head of ''Mister Tickles'' rotating on its stump. Burning. Jerking. Twitching. Yet ''alive''. And unseeing. I hope. Its coils reach down from either side as I hop over a wall of cables. Soundless, and shadowy, as I flit through metal halls. Massive gloves curling around the tops of the machines. But what now? Find my team? Kill Princess? Kill the Clown? I check my battered SMG, and my battered self, as the thing stomps past. Heavy, and stumbling. Its happy waistcoat flexing open like a vertical mouth, filled with spikes. Quick as I dare, I curve a padding arc around the back of the demonic machine. Polybius flickering in fits atop my gun as I hunt for a signal amid the metal. Suddenly, it solidifies. An eternal eye staring into my soul. "Can''t talk." I hiss. "Need options." It vanishes as two arrows appear on the hologram display. One, green, pointed toward my crew. One, red, toward the clown - a dataJack symbol hovering above it. I stop. I grin. Why, yes, I would like my own giant murder-bot. How did you know? Hell it might just save my crew, remove a threat, and scupper Princess all in one go. But what if they need me now? My HUD is all but dead. My comms a whole lot deader. If my crew were hurt, or killed, would I even know? Would Polybius even tell me? The arrows start blinking, and I curse. Machine is right. No time for dawdling. Always solve the maximum number of problems in one strike. And it''s right there. Fangs flicker as I narrow my eyes. Ghosting toward the clown on all fours. Easiest option is a quick grapple dash up to the head, and inside. But I''ll go up its newly hunched back. Spikes or no, it''s less swinging in the air. Then? Find a port. Jack in.... I hesitate again as my implant screams static. My vision cracked by green and purple lines. Shit. This could literally kill me. And Pol knows it could. I sub-vocalise a growl. Then, barely any louder, I hiss. "Pol. I need a spare implant. Who''s closest?" The other arrow twitches again. Wait. Green...? That''s not a random colour. Is it? I veer off, breaking into a soundless run on all fours. Bounding over fat cables, and under the dead engines of creation. "No-!" Tufty''s whispered voice pleads, somewhere far off in the cables and clutter. "N- No-!" I skid to a stop as my damaged ears triangulate - then I veer toward them. A streak on all fours, as Princess tinkles and giggles like a mad little girl. My feet hammering echoes off plate-metal machines as I bound faster and faster toward them. Erie, tinny, voices curling up through the squawking glitches of my dying implant. Princess is telling him a story. ".....once upon a time there was a poor, lost, little kitty all trapped and alone! A lost lil thing, all curled up and sweet! Mewling and crying and hugging his tail.... Hoping against hope that somebody would save him! But then, one day, a Beautiful Fairy Princess came fluttering down....!''" "No! Nonono-!" "And she said.... ''Oh! How can you cry, my little green kitty, when a Fairy has come to grant all your Wishes?'' And the kitty said-" "No! No! No!!! NO! NO!!!!!!" Princess sings out a laugh, wild and cheerily psychotic. "''Oh! Don''t you fret your little head'', The Fairy said! ''For we shall be Such Good Friends! And there''ll be milk in your bowl, and brushes every day!!''" I can''t get to him. I can''t. "But oh how the kitty was quivering! Like my own happy heart!" The Evil Fairy coos in sickly sweet glee, echoing off iron and concrete. "And oh how the Princess did-" I catch a flash of pink and green between blurring machines.Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon. An instant of terrible clarity, frozen in my mind like a photograph. There she is. That demonic girl. Her glittering wings flared wide above Tufty - who curls his small body tighter, and tighter, into a cold steel corner. Shaking and twisting and squirming away from her. His doll-like face locked in a noiseless scream. Something primal punctures my heart like a railgun. And I forget all about the clown. "LEAVE HIM ALONE!" I roar. Leaping the barrier in a wild blur of violence and hate. "GET AWAY FROM-!" Feet hit cool metal, and I kick off a bulbous machine. Claws flashing up through a holoprojector that melts around my hand like water and magic. A holo of a holo projector? I grab the bar it hung from, and slam my heels into its wire-braided surface. Forcing myself to ignore the empty air beneath me. The three metric drop at the edge of what I can handle. What the Hell do I do here? If I were Demon, or even Kami, I could just grab Tufty. And I would have already. We would already be gone. But I can''t. My hands just.... won''t move. I''m caught in my trauma, just as he is. Trapped by illusions and ghosts with terribly smug smiles. But I''ve got seconds before The Clown is in range. Even now, its massive blind body jerking as it tries to turn. Catching its curly shoes on the cables. Its heels on the edges of machines. They won''t keep it long. So I tune everything out. The demented glitches. The static, whispering to me of errors. The screaming note of death every rising in the back of my ear - a distant, but onrushing, train. Focusing myself, totally and utterly, on beating her illusions. On saving Tufty. So what do I do? Fight her projectors? Easy enough - if I can find them. But where? I need to think, and fast. Princess loves rigged games, just like our Evil Stepmother. But would she plaster every machine in this massive factory with military grade projectors? Even if she could afford to? No. Not likely. Which tallies with everything so far. She''s been stalking us with holo-bots, and funnelling us into traps. Her defences are mostly mobile, with a few scattered hard points. Entrances. Bottlenecks. That kinda thing. And she just killed all her own drone controllers. Leaving her with any random left-over- I suck a breath. It''s the factory. She''s hacking the freaking factory. Taking over holoScreens built to show diagrams, parts, and jams buried deep in machines. And now I bloody think about it, it''s bloody obvious. No way she smuggled an actual multi-story Plaything all the way from Toytown, over a thousand miles away. She must have built it. Here. With the very manufacturing robots she attacked us with. Which means, we hack the factory we hack her. A demonic grin splits my face. All I gotta do is get Tufty to a terminal and this is over. Mister Tickles crushes its boot down on something very fragile. In seconds, it''ll be here. Which means I''m dead outta time. Which means I''ve got to face my fears. I''ve got to grab Tufty and run. I twist in midair, and drop onto all fours behind Princess. But not too close. Smiling a wicked smile, as I cast the blinding light of my flare as widely as I can. "Tufty." I snarl. "Follow me. I''ll get ya out." "S-S-Spook. You-" "Tufty! Now! Move! Before-" "But you can''t go." Princess trills as glittered nails itch the edges of his livid green hair. "How can you GO when I''ve got to get you all brushed up for Mummy???" A low giggle slips free. "Got to make you nice as nice! Like sugar and spice! So she doesn''t think you''re all filthy animals." "Tufty. Now. Close your eyes. Start movin'' towards me." I warn, stepping to the left as Princess steps right. "Bitch is just a holo. She ain''t really there." But with Princess, it''s never so simple. "I...!!" Tufty stutters, one huge feline eye glittering with tears behind his fringe. Though the other side is barren. Dry. As if it doesn''t care at all. "I...." " ....And, you know.... While we''re playing Brush The Kitten....." The Fairy''s tone slips darker as a pair of long, steely, dressmaking scissors appear in her hand with a sparkle of magic. Snapping their long jaws with a Ka-snip Ka-snip of metal and murder. "I think it really is time we cut off this silly little fringe-" Tufty goes very, very still. His shining eye so huge, and quivering, and wet with tears. One clawed hand shaking as it rises to cover his already-covered eye. My heart goes still. Oh.... Shit..... Princess takes a single, dainty, step and the boy yowls in undeniable terror. Writhing and twisting away from her. Frantic, now. Desperate. Lashing out at nothing with claws and spitting teeth as she, ever so slowly, reaches in with gentle hands. Humming, so sweetly, as she snip snip snips the air. But there''s nowhere to go. His small body already jammed tight into the smallest, saddest, little hole he could find. Tangled by cables. Hemmed in by hard metal edges. Hiding his fringe-covered eye. As if welling up from a terrible distance, my voice returns in an absolute roar "GET AWAY FROM HIM!" I kick myself off the ground, like a rocket, as the vicious scissors snap ever so close to his flat-back ears. I don''t know if there''s a drone in that holo. I don''t know what''s in there. But whatever it is, it cannot be allowed to touch Tufty. Or far, far, far worse. The hair covering the left side of his face. I have only a fraction of an instant to falter, in mid-air, as the flarelight fails to burn away Princess like a dream upon waking. Its brilliance, instead, shimmering against her skin. Her dress. Her bows and glittery wings. Her very real body. And then The Fairy''s head twists round on its neck, like nothing alive. Like Moon. And she backhands me right out of the air with her dainty little hand. Smashing my back into a machine, opposite Tufty. "Tag! You''re it!!" She crows, hopping and giggling on the spot with her wand held high. The scissors dancing and snapping around her, with terrible joy. Flashing its big, dark, gemlike eyes. Shearing its own metal laugh. And then Princess goes very, very, still. Her eyes dangerous. And utterly unhinged. "Did someone Learn Their Lesson? Oh my! Now you know why Mummy Put ME In Charge! Not you!" And she sticks her tongue out. I push myself up. Teetering, slightly, as everything fuzzes and crackles. Purple fractures bleeding down my vision, as her head tilts. Robotically. A plastic smile ripping plastic lips. Merry, and mad, and glittering with psychopathic glee. To say nothing of actual glitter. So that''s it. That''s the trick, here. She printed herself a new body. Of course, only a fool would assume the bitch is out of cards. Princess is never out of cards. Not until she falls freaking over. And even then, there''s always one more. If she didn''t keep making the same freaking mistakes, she''d be unstoppable. "Tufty." I wheeze. "I''ll keep her busy. You run." "So you do care." She hums. Casually stabbing her words into my guts. "What." I stagger away from the machine. One hand on the ground. "Oh?" Her head tilts the other way. "Thought we didn''t notice? How bizarre! You really did!" She touches a plastic hand to plastic lip. "And here I thought you were smart....." She tails off, as my own dark laughter echoes off iron and steel. "God. I''ve been waitin'' so long for this." I grin like death. It''s her turn to stutter. Eyes flickering, as she checks every one of her calculations. Hunting for the massive freakin'' mistake she just made. "What. For what?" I crick out my back. Then my neck. "Somethin'' to punch." I say, quite softly. As the floor shakes again. Her eyes turn sharp. "Oh yes?" "I''m gonna murder you for real." I chuckle. "I''m gonna enjoy it." "Oh"" She beams. "Oh? Is that all? Why, for a moment I was worried!" Something icy taps my soul on the back. Tricks within tricks. "You know." Princess says, quite cheerfully, as the shaking suddenly stops. A huge shadow darkening all but her. "I don''t like it when the other children break my Toys. But. I suppose it doesn''t really matter....." All around us, the machines of an ancient world kick into sudden motion. "....not when I can make just as many as I want!" >>><<< >> The Teddybear Apocalypse >> The Teddybear Apocalypse A thrum of shuddering life roars through the factory around us. A hammering. A thudding. A shaping of raw iron, and steel, and plastic. A thousand processes awakening after a hundred years of silence. Gravitational conveyors stream with floating parts. Pumping gears, and wheels, and reams of wire into every machine around us. Which unfold into spider-armed monstrosities. With lasers, and blades, and stamping hammers all jerking to terrible life. Grids of red and green scan across us. Across everything. Steel fingers snapping up scraps of trash. Flecks of rubble. Broken parts. Forcing me to hop, and dance, and dodge between the darting arms. In half a breath, they''re done. And then the engines ROAR around me. A thousand stabbing tools blaze pure, and incandescent, white. Smearing trails across my broken vision as they fire timed globules of vaporised metal. Sucking the heat from the impact-site to print a skeleton at terrifying speed. Bones and sockets and blades grow from nothing at all, faster than thought. The shatter-headed clown leaning down upon us. Gripping the edges of the machines, as Princess laughs, and laughs beneath it. "TUFTY! COME ON!" I scream as factory systems tear past his face. Forcing me to twist, and flip, and dive between blades. Between hammers and nozzles that pump molten-hot plastic. But what can I do? Grab him? I can''t. I just can''t. But he will never move again, if I don''t- I force open my hand. I yell at him. I beg. But I know. I know the only solution is to- In a white hot instant of panic, I snatch his wrist and kick off the corner of the wall. Leaping to grab the top of the machine and roll us onto it. He stares up at me. Toy-sized and terrified. And guilt rams my heart as I hurl him aside. The kid twists to lash a instinctive kick-and-jump off an incoming machine. Tail streaming up and away. My own whipping wild as I leap the fat, car-crushing, fist of Mister Tickles. Metal crunching like tinfoil. Forcing me to stagger. To fight for balance. Blinding flashes of terrible light roaring up from the shattered depths of its blown-open skull. Spitting and literal fireworks. The whole of its head enswarmed by thousands of contraction bots. New eyes growing from the ruins, even as I stare. Holy shit. It was right in front of me. The Factory has its own, separate, drone system. That''s why she could just blow up her team. She didn''t need them anymore. I stagger back as the titanic head twitches toward me. Metal things clanging in the depths. Readying themselves to arise. To crush us, and devour us. But I''ve got a bloody plan. And so I run. Chasing the cat from engine to engine as the clown snatches at my legs with tender, twitching, fingers. Slamming its hands into machines all around us. Forcing us to duck for cover in the passages beneath, while Princess rises behind us. Resplendent, and terrible, and mad with maddening colour. But there is no escape. This entire freaking place is a construction line - with metal walls that unfolding and unravel. Lashing out at us us with beams of incandescent light. Slashing, and hacking away at our very lives. I catch Tufty again, and hurl him into a cross-hatched area. Hunkering there, as the world goes wild around us. "The Hell they making?" I yell. But Tufty is no help. Trapped, as he is, in a shivery little huddle of anxiety. Twitching, and jerking, as echoes of Princess skip across the factory. She''s everywhere. In every screen. Every reflection. She is the building. And, ready or not, here she comes. But I won''t give her the breath she needs to build her army. Because that army is gonna be mine. I rip open a panel with my claws. Revealing a labyrinth of cables and tiny, ticking, drones that seem very surprised to see us. I ignore it all, and feel along the underside. "No ports. We can''t jack in." "Show me." My gun crackles, tweaking one of my ears up. "Sure." I shove my pistol''s camera into the dark, dusty, void beneath the machines. Tracking it over cables. Junctions. Bundles of wire. Forgotten tools. Scurrying shapes that slip into darkness. "Got it?" A long instant of silence. And then- "Scan everything." It states. "What? Why-?" But the image vanishes. I wet hesitant lips inside my breather. The factory a roaring, demonic, force that shakes my insides. Faster. Faster. Building to a brutal climax as we work. My vision fractured by bleeding threads of unholy purple. No way can I even attempt a scan. My implant is cooked. My HUD is just.... gone. But I got other options. "Tufty. Get over here. Quick." I hiss through the filters. The cat lets out a soft little noise, but nods. His left hand flickering with strange little lights. I turn to guard him. But no. There''s no time for caution. Not when we could cut off the existence of this army before it ever springs to life. I rip off another panel, and hammer my arm into its metal guts. Curse, then rip off others. A terrible well of fear boiling inside me. Ticking down to death, like the snip of those sheers. Shink. Shink. I can hear them. They''re closing in. The entire floor shaking as her malformed ''friends'' spring into life. Ripping their way free of the very machines that created them. And then turning. Clattering. Twisting to face us. A fingerless, velvet-stitched, hand jerks around the corner. Dragging a flat, pink, circle of a head inflated with thick plushie stuffing. Another, and another! All bodies clothed in table-cloth dresses. In stitched-together seat-covers from a long-ago train. A mockery of a child''s first raggedy doll. With a painted-on smile. And then. As if by some order. They speak. "GOODIE! GOODIE! NEW-NEW FRIENDS!" Scream each and every one, in a metal-torn chorus direct from Hell itself. Tottering, rigidly, on too-stiff legs, as they stare at us with coal-beaded eyes. "Oh shit no!" I yowl, bounding back and away. The first, and closest, flailing a leap at Tufty. Arms wide. Stitched mouth ripping into a hideous wail. "HUGS ARE HOW WE SAY ''I CARE''!" It tries to loop him with its bendy limbs. My heart jerking. My useless hands snapping forward, as if I can fight my own mind.Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator. But Tufty ain''t half as afraid of some freakish puppet as he is of Princess. He leaps directly up, kicking off its pastel-shaped head into a whipping backflip. The Plaything stumbles. And the cat lands on my back, light as a thrown cushion. Tail a bright green lash behind him. I panic. I almost throw him to the damned bots. But, instead, I flick him off and hammer out a [Burst] fire. Twice. Pummelling their front line, as we back away at a rapid lick. "TIME FOR A TEA PARTY! OH-HO!!" Chortles a fat and horribly flowery pot. Huge glassy eyes rolling toward us as nightmarish smoke and liquid fire bubble from its spout. We leap across the mayhem of another production line as everything explodes behind us. A rage of torrential fire to rival the Eternal Storms outside. The monsters pissing great burning streams of fire in every direction. Plastering the plate metal machines. The cables. Themselves. Belching smoke, but never burning, as they march us ever backwards. Faces melting right off their heads in slick, burning, strips. I hammer them again, and again. Sending bots tumbling, back, into the own flames. Crawling toward me, through the flames, as we leap a production-line choked by tube-filled components. Metal arms flicking free from the walls. Twisting to stab us, and snap off our fingers. I block with my SMG, and roll.
LMG Red Glory SMG :: 281/440
"She''s bleedin'' off our ammo!" I yell. "I got one mag left, but she''s got a damn army! We can''t fight it!" "R-right!" Tufty stutters, as if he''d even been trying. "Fall back! Fall back! Go!" We bolt through the maze of hammering engines. Left, and right, and left again. Keeping to our yellow-striped sanctuaries as we filter our way through Princess''s massive trap. But massive is almost an understatement. And we''re running out of time. I skid into an alleyway, and jam my neuroJack cable at a port. Then another. "It don''t bloody fit!" I snarl at the cat. "It don''t fit anything!" "Oh. Having trouble?" He purrs in a girlish mockery of his own real voice. Head ratcheting to one side, like a plaything doll''s, to reveal a slatted eye shining with malice and fear. "You don''t really think you can Hack my Bestest Bestie? Do you?" "Piss off, Princess." I sneer. But The word jerks in the air. Turning into "Tufty." "There! There!" He sobs. "I knew you didn''t like me! Wah! Wah! Wah!!" The face snaps suddenly neutral. "Did I ever show you what''s under the hair? I really do think Princess should cut it off. Even if I scream and beg." I don''t answer. Storming my way to the next machine, and tearing its control-system apart. But the tek is as alien to me as I am to it. Its designs archaic. Relics of a civilisation long brought to dust. I cannot connect. I just can''t. Tufty''s head tilts strangely. Leaving a shadowy echo of real behind. "Say. How are you going to hack it, anyway? Didn''t our bestist best hacker have a Tewible Accident?" A ghostly hand mimes a trip down the stairs. "So-" The thing stealing his image stops. Cold. Princess steps free of him. Her skin greying before my eyes as a nightmare of wings and cogs whirls into being above my weapon. Flickering, and dark. As if projected from shadow, not light. "YOU." She breathes. "No..... No..... NO! YOU AREN''T HERE! YOU CAN''T BE! YOU BELONG TO-" "No." Polybius states, with the finality of granite. The girl''s lip trembles. Suddenly vulnerable, in a way she never was before. "But-" "No." It repeats, and I hear springs tighten within its unholy shadows. The image shifting as the many eyes of The Machine Mind flick to me. "Group cohesion has been shattered. All of you are alone." I glance at the girl peeling herself from Tufty. Her eyes frozen, boggling and huge. As if all her reality had come crashing down at once. "And what are you doin''?" "Guiding. Assessing primary and secondary targets. Running battle simulations." I nod. "Connection is a no-go. It''s plan B and D from here." I flick an eye at Princess. "Tell Kami ''Rule One''. Demon grabs the shorties. Rally the rest on me t''s- i time to kill a bitch." "And what will you do?" The ghost of Princess twists through sneering lips. Batting her lush lids. "Do tell?" My jaw sets like iron. "What I gotta." I snarl, pushing out a low breath. "Polybius. Time for some extreme prejudice. I''m goin'' full out, so prep for entry." Princess steps around me. Staring at me from every angle. "But you can''t get in." My ears flatten. "Says you. Bitch-queen of bullshit." But Princess smiles right back. "You do know that isn''t Polybius. Don''t you?" She says, primly. A psycho smile lighting her oh-so-white teeth. "And, oh dearie me, you forgot about my little warning? Didn''t you? Ho hum." And then she''s gone, in a puff of animated confetti. My stabbing finger falters, but then I gird my teeth. "Bloody lies. C''mon." And we run. Ripping through the factory in a blur of claws, and streaming tails, and painted metal. Of cables hooked, and swung from, as we move like only GMOs can. As the things in the metal maze close ever in, and in. "Projected rally point, thirty metrics ahead." "Go! Go!" I yell, a flash of blue above as Zipper front-flips out of a very high window. A massive, blue-velvet, bunny crashing out behind him. For almost a second, he seems to fly. Echoes of broken holo fracturing around his arms, like wings. And then he falls. Swooping down, and down, on a rappel I can''t even see. Vanishing, as I pull even with him. My snarling face tracking the lumbering hulk of Mister Tickles as it turns. Staring at his last position, with a half-built face. We pour on speed. My gun flicking with arrows that begin to cross as we close on my team. A sorry replacement for my HUD, now carved by scars of darkness that itch and twitch across my vision. A devils hymn of chaos screaming at me from the corners of reality. Eager to consume me. The clock is accelerating. Nineteen minutes, ten seconds, until everything fails. My life ticking rapidly to zero, as Mister Tickles expands in my vision. Our steps hunted by monster in a metal maze. Our breath sharp as the painted stripes blur beneath us. My flare sputtering. Edging on failure. I slam heels into a skid as something fuzzy and blue hammers in from one side. Impacting the floor like a mortar shell. For half an instant I think it''s Zipper. But Zipper isn''t two metrics wide. "Hello children. Did you miss me?" Princess sneers, in the exact tone of Moon. Stepping, lightly, from the paw of a doofy blueberry bear. Its big, stupid, face a mayhem of colours and glitches and darkness. Barely a holo at all. As if she knows about my implant. As if she''s trying to confuse me. Or get in my head. Or she''s already there. But I narrow my eyes. Snapping my SMG up to the ready as I blow her left wing apart. Ripping a line of bullets all the way through it, and half up one shoulder. I guessed bloody right. It''s her. The android. "Saved me a bloody walk!" I roar, leaping high to crash down upon her. The droid twisting to one side, so I land directly ahead. Whipping a clawed kick right at her face. She''s smiling. Why is she- Wait! Shit! I leap, straight up, as the bear''s heavy fist skates past my nose. Punching a solid, three-foot, hole in the side of a machine. Static screaming along the whole length of its massive, hairy, arm. Shooting me glimpses of the flowing, articulated, metal beneath. God. It''s so hard to focus. My mind is tearing apart. The bear turns its flickering, unreal, head. And somewhere inside I hear an old tape-recorder click. Dull speakers rattling their way through the first, tired, bars of The Teddybear''s Picnic. "I made a friend! Do you like him?" Princess beams. Bringing a pretty foot down on my back. I spin away from it, and her toes crack the floor. The droid''s ankle spinning itself into a cork-screw, to bring the other around in a sweep. Snapping it clean past my nose. Spinning her again, like a top, as she brings her heel into the mix. The bear hammering a fist, right at my knee, as she whirls around for the third. I hop backward, onto the arm. And Princess smiles, dropping her leg and lifting the other. Snapping her foot back into place. "Oh what fun we''ll have, when I bring you all home!" Princess sings, with a guillotine snap of her scissors. "I''ll bake you a cake, and we''ll all hold hands! And there''ll be fun, and blood, and screaming every day!" I jink left as she leaps, but the damned bear moves in time with her. An extension of her body. Its fist arcing right past my eyes. Right toward at Tufty, who leaps and flails. Shrieking and crying as a thousand images of Princess swing scissors and wands at his tail. "And you! Little kitty! I''ll make you into such a pretty little doll! With green felty ears, and a great big SMILE!" "It ain''t real! Tufty! Get over with-" I falter, as the flare sputters its last few sparks. The holos drawing in, tight once more. "Oh my." Princess sings. "And now the REAL fun begins!" I flip backward, again, as a cartoon paw hammers into the ground, breaking concrete. But there is no impact. None. The real paw is behind me, and I dive forward as it snaps closed - right where my spine was. Awwww! Doesnt ooo want a huggie from Mr Deady-bear? Princess purrs as that massive, goofy, cartoon thing turns to me. Titanic paws multiplying as it swoops to crush my skull. My gun fixates it, but what the Hell do I even shoot!? Whats even in there!? A sudden flicker, and I jerk to attention. "Warning: two of the team are dead." It cracks. "Demon has lost most of his blood. Badger is pursued. He says ''goodbye Spook. I love-''" "SHUT UP!" I scream. "SHUT UP, YOU LYING WHORE!!" The bear thunders down upon me, and I raise my gun on impulse. Firing at its face. "YAHH! Stop! Help! SOS!" Badger screams, barrelling through the illusion. Right as the real fake bear slams him from the side. A fuzzy elbow knocking him clear across the room - smashing his head into a machine. Forcing a jolt of terror through my legs. His head. With no helmet. "FAKE!!!" I scream, leaping to grab at the arms of the bear. "EVERYTHING IS-" "Badger is unconscious. His skull is fractured. Tufty is in danger." "NO!" I spit. "NOT REAL!!" But I''m leaping toward him. Arms outreached. A wall of cold steel slams into my chest. A massive, metal, claw on a huge articulated arm. All cables wrapped in rings and rings of metal. Wind whistling around me. "Reaper Protocol." I whisper. A hopeless command to my dead implant. And it hammers my back into the steel wall of a machine. "Spook! NO!!" Tufty screams. "REAPER PROTOCAL!" I roar, again, as the arm draws back. My arms like jelly. My legs hanging loose. SMASH. I feel the armour crack along my back. The world tipping as it lifts me high. Intending to end it. To end me. To break me on the concrete floor, and shatter the parts to the wind. "Reaper....." I breathe, as the air billows up around me. Slow at first. Quickening, as my finger hooks the manual release on my battleStim. Dumping the entire cartage into my bloodstream. "PROTOCAL!" My heartrate rockets to infinity. Blood screaming through my veins. My body contorting in agony and rage and fire and hate that could burn away the world. For a single instant, time simply stops. And then, inside me, something else is born. >>><<<