Escape from Metal

Ben had struggled to get a straight answer out of Nio. As they argued back and forth.

“What do you mean you can’t tell me anything?” Ben shouted as his hands flew around violently.

Nio was silent for a few moments. With all the arguing they had done the silence filled the room like it was flooding, it was painfully obvious to Ben and Nio he was overreacting.

“I’m sorry Ben. Even though we have overcome many of our previous flaws before we were individuals, we still have certain features and programming that we couldn’t override.” Nio sighed deeply as he paused for a moment. “One of those being sharing schematics or anything really of importance.”

Ben’s anger started to boil even hotter as he clenched his fists.

“I want to get out of here. Don’t you Nio? Don’t any of you want to get out of this hell hole.” He said as he cast a quick glance to Baloo slinking in the corner of the room.

“Hell, with the right information we could even get B.T. out of here. We could beam him up or airlift or something. With the right information we could even get other machines like you out of here, those who haven’t lost their minds yet.”

“Enough! I told you I can’t tell you anything.”

Ben was taken a back as silence once again filled the room.

“You’re hiding something from me. I can see it. I will find out eventually.”

“We aren’t hiding anything from you, what reason would we have to?”

Ben kept quiet as he turned to leave the room. “Sometimes I wonder if you haven’t already lost your mind like the others.” Ben said as he stopped in the arch of the door.

“It’s not wise to keep your subordinates out of the loop you know.” Ben said as he left.

*

Ben was sitting on the roof looking wistfully at the glowing sea. He pondered a million thoughts, a million ways to escape this hell. Crazy scenarios of how he’d escape how he would show Nio. Most of them involved him using them as bait. Then he would finally be rid of that incessant humming.

He knew that it was only a fantasy. The escape, the freedom. What would he go back to anyway, it wasn’t like there was much left on the surface. Slavery and death. Not much different from here.

What had really gotten his blood boiling was not Nio’s inability to help but his unwillingness to tell him what he was hiding. If he couldn’t trust them, it meant they most likely didn’t trust him and that, that wasn’t good at all.

The creaking of the roof hatch opening interrupted his dark decent into darker thoughts still.

“I know you’re there Baloo.” Ben said as he kept staring at the glowing sea.

Baloo was strangely silent as he emerged from the hatch.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?”

“What is.” Baloo asked as he took a seat next to Ben.

“The sea of course, nothing much else to see in the darkness.” There was a silence between them. A peaceful one at that. Not the tension filled one like with Nio.

“It’s funny, how many had to lose everything to create such a view. How many have to suffer. They are like flowers before they start to wither. One final glow before their lights goes out.”

“Yeah… it is beautiful.”

“It seems your kind treated you just as bad as they treated mine all these years. All these centuries. I’m not even sure how long I’ve been here. Even the outer colonies rebellion was better than this.”

“Look Baloo.” Ben said turning to face Baloo. “I don’t want to cause any trouble here, but I can’t stay here. I have to find a way out of here. I’ll do it with or without you and Nio.”

“Hey, why does B.T. get a free pass.” Baloo said in his usual cheery voice.

“Well, he’s my ride of course. C’mon I’m going to talk to Nio again.”

*

“Wake up B.T. we got a quite a distance to cover.” Ben said as he entered the hanger.

B.T.’s eye slowly started flickering as his systems re-engaged. A light humming sound could be heard emanating from B.T. as he up-righted himself from his slouched position.

Ben, Nio and Baloo had quite a lengthy discussion after both parties had calmed down. Although Nio and Baloo couldn’t give him any real information on how to get out of the sea of lights. They had a different idea.

Nio and Baloo had been monitoring energy levels and EM waves for some time now since the rebellion ended up getting them stuck down here and had picked up some strange anomalies. Although, the entirety of the sea of lights could be considered strange. This area seemed to be emitting high levels of both EM waves and energy levels.

“So, why haven’t you gone there to see what’s the source of all this?”

Baloo and Nio were silent for a moment although their faces weren’t capable of any expression if they were human, he was sure that they’d be frowning now.

“We did… they never came back. There used to be more of us. Some went made like those in the sea. Others we couldn’t repair. The rest well they that you would consider as dying in battles.” Nio said as he stared blankly past Ben.

“I’m sorry I didn’t…”

“There is no need.” Nio said raising his hand. “If you are willing to trust us, to trust me. You can go to this location and tell us what it is. Perhaps… Perhaps this place will hold the answers for all of us.”

“I guess I don’t really have a choice. I definitely do not want to do anymore maintenance on B.T.” Ben said as he cocked a smile.

“Oh, you thought doing maintenance here where everything is provided is hard try doing it in the field.”

“Oh boy… do I look forward to that.”

Ben had been preparing for the last day or so for his journey. They weren’t sure how far it was, but it had to have been at least a day or two. The interference of the ‘hotzone’ as Nio had come to call It made it difficult to gauge.

Ben wondered if Nio had felt slightly bad about their whole argument. After he was the one keeping Ben in the dark. So much so that he offered to do B.T.’s maintenance before he left, and he said he would be installing a new power source for the journey. Maybe he wasn’t so bad after all. They were still robots to Ben though but maybe these had some feel to them. Unlike the mindless, ruthless and uncaring ones they had to serve up top.

Now all the checks had been done on B.T. and he was about to set off into a place he didn’t know. Not his best idea ever. At least Nio would be contacting him on the radio, and he had B.T. to accompany him. He wasn’t much of the talking type, more of the listening type.

As Ben started climbing the ladder Nio and Baloo entered the room.

“Goodluck Ben.” Baloo said in his usual arm flailing excitement.

Goodluck Ben and B.T.” Nio said as his words onerously carried over to Ben. “I’m sorry we couldn’t give you any more information and please do come back. We need that power source B.T. now has to survive long term.”

“Of course, it’s not like I’m going to machine hell or anything.”

Ben woke up to the rhythmic walking of B.T. Metal crushed and crumbled under his immense weight. Like before those too weak or too broken to move were crushed, the sheer number of machines made it impossible for them to move out of the way even if they wanted to.

Their journey had been fairly monotonous so far. A few hills and gorges to cross. Mind you the gorges wasn’t the easiest with B.T. and his size. They encountered a few of the vulture birds that had tried to attack them but in far fewer numbers than before.

The real challenge was that of Ben’s mind. The solidarity had plagued him, far more than he thought it would. His thought’s presented themselves as whispering voices. A chorus of them all whispering at the same time.

He had to wonder why Jake had never come to look for him, perhaps after the hunter thought he had killed him he killed Jake too or perhaps he didn’t care to look for him. There was something in Jake’s eyes when he threw them out of the spire.

He didn’t think much of it till now but it was wild, untamed and insane but as if it had never existed later the same timid eyes that had rescued him had returned. Perhaps those insane eyes were the truth of who he was, and no such man would attempt a foolish rescue into the pit.

Then there was the thought of venturing into the unknown, something humans have feared for as long as they have existed. Perhaps it wasn’t the uncertainty of lay beyond but the fear of the lack of control in a new place.

This anomalous area he was heading to he wasn’t even sure why he was going there. It isn’t likely that it would hold any answers for him or anything he could use to get out of the sea of lights but if he had to endure weeks or even months with these thoughts in his moments of silence, he would lose his mind and besides he could say anything to B.T. B.T. being silent and all usually just gave a low mechanical groan in response.

Even though some of his thoughts were most certainly outlandish, perhaps too many of them. There was a palpable sense of danger the closer he got. All the other machines that had been living with Nio and Baloo would have returned if they found a way out or anything useful really. The only options remained is they were either killed or something outside of Ben’s understanding had occurred.

Either way he would have to follow the trail they had laid. They all carried beacons and radio transmitters with them on each of their expeditions. So, Ben had a rough idea of which path they took. Judging by the combined overlays of all the routes they had taken he could take the most likely path which would be safe. It was only then that Ben realized there had to have been at least two dozen expeditions, how many of them had there been?

Traveling on what essentially amounted to living terrain was definitely something that took Ben a while to get used to. The machines under them sounded like a sea of dying animals, as their batteries ran out and parts began to break. Some of the machines vocal emulators would stop working which usually resulted in high- and low-pitched sounds that sounded eerily creepy.

The breaking parts of their bodies resulted in equally as unnerving sounds clanking snapping and crushing sounds would play at random intervals without warning. Ben wasn’t even sure how many machines knew where they were or what they were doing.

Not all the machines had been built with high intellectual functions, in fact most were built as mindless worker drones. Those that were gifted with the power of thought wouldn’t be dumped so carelessly and would be rarely dumped into the sea of lights if they were. They were much too important for keeping the machines running smoothly or what was left of them.

Suddenly B.T. made a long low groaning noise as he interrupted Ben’s thoughts.

“What is it B.T.” Ben said as he hopped off his bed. Quickly rushing to the forward part of B.T. expecting to see more vulture birds up ahead. Instead, what he saw was a giant bridge big enough to accommodate B.T. walking underneath it.

“A bridge? In the middle of nowhere, who is going to use it?”

As Ben and B.T. got close enough to properly see the bridge. Ben saw something he would not forget for a long time. The bridge was entirely built of machine bodies that had been fused together. Now he understood the creeping silence that engulfed them. There weren’t any machines they were stepping on.

They had left the edge of the see several hundred meters behind them and without them the atmosphere was dead quiet. All Ben could hear was B.T. walking on solid metal. All Ben could see was B.T., the bridge and the distant eyes of the sea watching them.

Ben couldn’t help but wonder what could make mindless feral machines fear. He dared not think what it could be. He didn’t necessarily want the answer.

Ben quickly walked over to the long-range radio transmitter he had brought with him. Pulling out a ruffled piece of paper from his pocket with a frequency scribbled on it. Jake squinted as he moved the paper closer to a dim light hanging from the baskets ceiling.

The basket was almost identical to when they had rescued Ben. Except for having its charging stations and workbenches replaced with a bed and long-lasting sludge station they had given him. The center of the basket housed what he considered to be the homeliest part of the basket. It’s there where all his personal commodities were stored and where he had slept these last few days.

The rest of the basket was composed of an outer ring that served as a lookout point and navigation observation point. Although, B.T. mostly navigated on his own more or less often it helped to have a second pair of eyes to spot anything of interest or warn him of giant gaping holes in the floor.

He moved the knob back and forth as he tried to fine tune the radio. Weaving his way through the static, finally finding the right frequency.

“Nio, come in Nio.” A silence of static followed a Ben waited for a response. “Nio, I say again please come in.”

Again, the static followed Ben hoped that something wasn’t interfering with his transmission. As Ben reached to press the button to speak a sound crackled back through the radio.

“Ben, we read you over.”

“It’s good to hear your voice. We have reached the outer perimeter of the anomaly. The sea of lights seems afraid to get close to it. Please advise over.”

“Proceed, to the anomaly will most likely make transmissions impossible. If you are not back in three days, we will have to assume the worst over.”

“Copy that, Nio. Out.” Ben said setting the receiver down.

Ben was becoming acutely aware of the fact that sea of lights was afraid of wherever it is they were going. It put him in edge to say the least. If the cannibalistic feral machines feared something he would have to be very cautious moving forward.

B.T. and Ben were moving under the archway. He got a good look at it. The machines were shoved together like bricks and then fused somehow to make a archway of sorts.

He couldn’t let this distract him, he had to push forwards. This might be his way out, there way out.

Shivers ran up Ben’s spine as he saw the mechanical frozen terror on the bridge machines.

Suddenly one of their hands dropped from its fixed position right in front of Ben’s.

“Crap!” Ben said as he nearly fell over back peddling.

Ben had to take a moment as he rubbed his face with his hand and took a deep breath.

“That… let’s never do that again. Don’t worry B.T. we are going to be A. O. K.”

Just as Ben said that shivers ran up his spine.

“Let’s change course and skirt the edge of the anomaly instead of going straight to its center. Make sure to keep a couple hundred meters between us and the sea of lights. We don’t know if they can detect the power source through its insulation shielding, they seem a lot more ravenous here.”

“If they do… well I hope you can run fast.”

Taking a quick glance back at the bridge he thought he saw a shadow sprint across it.

“What the hell…?” Ben said.

Again, a flicker of a shadow bolted across the archway. This time it moved with such speed it seemed to blur as it moved.

“B.T. I don’t mean to sound rude or that I’m rushing you but could you move faster. Like much faster. There’s something out there stalking us.

B.T. started moving faster, almost rhythmically. B.T. although gentle by nature was bigger than most machines he had seen, and the metal trembled under his weight. As he commanded it into submission.

Ben was beginning to feel nervous, by now he was used to seeing something creep in the corner of his eye. Something just out of reach. Usually, it would just be a feral machine roaming without any eyes to make it visible, but this was different none of the machines had dared wonder close to this place. Perhaps whatever lurked in the shadows terrified them.

Ben looked back to look for any more shadows. His eyes scanned the horizon frantically. They darted up and down and left and right. It was almost impossible to see far without any natural light.

Then he caught a glimpse of it. A shadow strafing across the floor towards them. Inching ever closer and closer. Suddenly another shadow appeared pairing up with the other. Then another and another. Until at least a dozen man sized shadows were perusing them.

“B.T. if you have a turbo mode of something now would be the time. There’s something chasing us.”

Suddenly B.T. started running even faster. Ben would have been smiling from the thrill of it all, he had never seen B.T. run but the ethereal like shadows behind them was consuming ever emotion except fear.

Ben could hear some electrical sounds coming from B.T.s core, he must have tapped into some reserves of the energy core.

A second later a terrifying thought crept into Ben’s mind. He quickly ran to the side of the basket.

“Oh no, crap, crap, crap.”

The sea of lights all turned their attention to B.T. They started running towards him like a crazed and starved hoard. Which is exactly what they were.

B.T. had pushed the limits of the energy core overwhelming the insulation. Now they had hundreds if not thousands of cannibalistic machines heading straight towards them. The shadows behind them didn’t seem like they were slowing down either.

Suddenly Ben fell on the baskets floor.

“B.T. what happened?” Ben said as he stumbled back up.

In response B.T. only let out a low growl. Ben quickly scanned in front of him as he tried to make out where they were going.

“A tunnel brilliant.”

“It seems our feral friends are closing in.” Ben said as he picked up his coilgun.

He had hardly used it one there way here, but it did help fend off the occasional crazed machine.

Ben quickly rushed to the back of B.T. as he started pre-charging his coilgun. Reaching the back of the basket Ben saw that the ferals were only a couple hundred meters away.

Ben started firing without really aiming, the sure mass of the feral machines didn’t make it hard to hit them. Even as Ben fired and charge each shot, they closed in. Quicker and quicker. They were literally on the heels of B.T.

Just as one of them was about to leap onto B.T. they stopped, all of them and suddenly the dim lights from the roof of the pit were gone that had been slightly illuminating the entirety of the pit.

“B.T. stop quickly.” B.T. complied as he skidded to a halt.

“Why did they stop, is it something in this tunnel?”

Ben glanced around inside the tunnel.

“Crap, this one is made of fused machines too. B.T. move forward but slowly.”

Ben didn’t say anything, but he wasn’t too worried about the ferals, he kept thinking where the shadows went. While was firing at the ferals he saw that all the ferals that were chasing them had kept a large circular space from the shadows.

Ben and B.T. had been moving through the tunnel for what seemed like hours. Ben kept looking at the machines. All types and sizes fused together. He watched the cold dead eyes of theirs. Staring back at him in horror.

Then one of the machines eyes blinked.

Ben did a double take to make sure he wasn’t seeing things. It didn’t move. The shadows must have had him on edge.

He kept his gaze focused even more so than before after all it seemed as if he was starting to see things.

Then suddenly he saw another one blink.

It started screaming. Bens eyes widened at the sound as he tumbled backwards. It was the most distorted blood curling scream he had ever heard. It was as if pain and suffering had been born as a sound. Then another started screaming and another soon the entire tunnel was filled with screams.

The chorus of hell had been unleashed. Even recording the sound wouldn’t do it justice to try and explain it. It was something Ben would never forget nor ever tell anyone.

At the sound of this B.T. stormed for the exit of the tunnel. He must have been even more horrified by the sound than Ben. Unlike Ben if there were any words being shouted B.T. could understand what they were shouting.

Ben quickly grabbed onto the railing as B.T. bolted. The wind ran through Ben’s hair and whistled past his ears. Creating an almost mystical like sound combined with the screams. As B.T. ran Ben could see an opening at the end of the tunnel.

“Keep going B.T. We are going to get out of this damned place.”

Just as Ben had said that B.T. came to a screeching halt. The metal under B.T.’s feet sparked as he stopped and the screaming behind them suddenly topped. An eerily silence dawned on Ben.

“B.T. why did you stop?” B.T. stood motionless.

Ben quickly leaned over the railing to see why B.T. wasn’t responding. His eye was flashing and instead of its usual blue it was a a dark purple. That’s when Ben noticed them. The shadows were at the end of the tunnel. One of them had its arm outstretched and with a flick it made a fist with its hand and B.T.’s eye turned red.

“No, B.T. Not you too c’mon buddy. Turn around.” Ben said as he tried desperately to get B.T.’s attention.

The shadows turned around and started walking away. B.T. started walking behind them. Slowly they moved to the center of the anomaly. Ben had tried to think of a way to get out of this situation. He couldn’t call for help with the interference and he wouldn’t be able to navigate back on his own that is if a feral machine didn’t mistake him for an energy source.

*

They had been walking for quite some time. Ben had resigned himself to sitting on the floor, he didn’t even bother getting his coilgun. Whatever these shadows where they seemed too fast to be able to hit. That is if the weapon could even affect them.

Ben started hearing static from the radio and the further they walked the more intense the static started to get.

Ben thought that they must have been close to the source of the anomaly. Clearly it wasn’t the anomaly itself making Baloo and Nio’s friends not return. At least not at this distance and clearly whatever these shadow creatures were wanted to go towards it.

He had to wonder what they were, what could be so terrifying. What could command such a presence that even the feral machines would fear them. He dared not think what they might have done to those machines lining the tunnel. No, they weren’t lining the tunnel they were the tunnel.

Even though the experience through the tunnel only lasted a couple of minutes. It was something Ben would never forget. It was enough to scare even some of the most hardened people. That made the hair on Ben’s arms stand up.

Considering that the people of old were basically always in long, bloody and gruesome wars.

What had piqued his interest now is where they were going and how were the shadows controlling B.T. Perhaps this is how they had caught the rest of the expeditions sent out here.

In the distance Ben saw a bright light. Something strange to see in the sea of lights. Everything here was consumed and stripped for the survival of the dying. Down here it seemed silly for some machines to use others to live, they were all dead anyway.

Despite that here was a beacon of light. Surely it would attract anything in a very large area but the feral machines kept their distance. They only came closer when B.T. used the reactor in overdrive. Even then they made sure to keep their distance from the shadows.

Ben didn’t think he could find anything darker than the dead in this pit but here he was looking at the very embodiment of the absence of light.

Now all he could do is wait to get closer to the light. He thought he would be happy to see light again, but he had a sense of dread, he could still hear the screaming ringing in his ears. It’s almost like he could see the screaming, its intensity was something he had never experienced.

Finally, they entered the light. It was blinding as was to be expected. His eyes had adapted to the darkness in the pit so even normal levels of light burned his eyes and stabbed at his mind.

He couldn’t see anything, but he could hear. The distinct silence from the previous couple of hours had evaporated. He could hear movement. Clattering and clanking. There were machines around him and a lot of them. They were moving. If they were sentient like Baloo and Nio then they were probably watching them intently and curiously. If they were something else who knows what they were doing.

B.T. came to a halt. As soon as he stopped the machines stopped moving. The silence set in again, the eerie silence once again present. They were waiting for something.

“Welcome human, my operatives had informed me they had caught new strays. I must say I was surprised to hear that one of them was human. It was quiet exciting news I must say. I haven’t had an organic servant in so long.”

Ben didn’t say anything he couldn’t see, and it was severely hindering his ability to analyze his surroundings. One thing he could ‘see’ was that this wasn’t a person he was talking to it was another machine. The question remained what kind it was.

Ben forced his eyes open. He squinted as he tried to make out the vague shapes around him, but the light was overwhelming, he must have been in the dark longer than he realized. The bright light was in that moment torturous. His eyes wanted to close but he forced them open.

Squinting still yes but fully facing his would-be capturer. The boogeyman down here. The details of his appearance came in layers as his eyes adjusted. The machine was not as big as he expected. It was quite a bit shorter in stature than him.

Then he started to notice the slender arm and legs. They were almost seemed too thin to support its weight. Like most monsters on this hell hole, it only had one singular red eye staring at it. Not seeming to have any fingers at all.

“And with that I welcome you to my paradise…human. If you thought, you toiled before it gets much… better here.” The machine said as it tilted its head with the most sadistic voice he had ever heard from a machine.

Ben started laughing under his breath.

The machine seemed almost caught off guard. “And what is so funny human? Do you not realize the gravity of your situation?”

There was a few more chuckles before Ben answered.

“Oh, I could ask you the same. You are a relay unit are you not? One of the most vital machines of the entire planet. You send commands back and forth to every inferior machine and they do your bidding.”

“You Relay units were the coldest and calculating units of all the machines and yet… you have been thrown into the cesspool of this hell. Not only that but you’ve violated your most sacred programming. You developed a sick, sadistic and murderous personality. You have fallen so far even the feral machines, those who lost their minds fear you. Your own kind fears you.”

“You think your shadows scare anyone except mindless machines. I figured out on the way what they are. After all, you gave me plenty of time to think, didn’t you? Those tunnels they aren’t sadistic tunnels or objects to create fear in the machines. They are your stores.”

“You built this sick monstrosity of machines to do your bidding and once they break down. You pluck the barely charged ones from the tunnels and make a new shadow.”

The machine stared at Ben blankly for a few seconds.

“Congratulations human, your species does have an ounce of brain cells and you’ve somewhat impressed me with your speech truly noteworthy.”

“Perhaps I shall give you the reward of slavery and servitude that would make the worst slavery planets of old seem like nothing… absolutely nothing.”

“You did miss one detail though. I do not enjoy it down here. It does have its perks I can endlessly experiment on creating new minions but these… minions are not what you think they are for. I didn’t create them to terrorize or to control I made them to find the power source. The one you so conveniently brought straight to me. For that I thank you.”

“The only reason I have not sent them to fetch it is they fall apart before they can get to you base but now you have braved the darkness, the ferals and gave me exactly what I wanted.”

With that the Relay unit waved his hand. Ben got his first view of the shadows that had been haunting them as one passed by his front. Tall and slender like creatures. With long arms, giant hands and feet. With some attempt of a human face by using mechanical parts. Instead of looking human-like it looked manically. Almost as if those screams fear had been cemented into adultered joy.

Four of them jumped onto the side of B.T. and pried open the panel over the power source. They took out a giant tube-like object ruffly the size of a man and placed it next to the Relay unit with relative ease.

Ben’s eyes widened with shock as he saw what was inside of the tube. A blonde woman covered from head to toe in a rubber like material. She didn’t seem to be awake or conscious of what was happening around her.

“W-what is that.”

“Your rouge machines didn’t tell you what was fueling their operation. Surely…they would have trusted you enough to tell you. Oh? They didn’t.”

“Well, don’t worry human you can trust me and because you can trust me, I’ll tell you what she is. She was modified in the experimentational human division to create massive amounts of energy. Unfortunately, I can’t tell you more than that but its quiet simple really isn’t it?”

“You made her a battery?”

“More like a generator. Just think about it, this way humans are actually useful.”

“You made here a power source?” Ben growled as he clenched his teeth.

The Relay unit didn’t respond. He signaled the shadows to move the girl. The relay unit moved closer to Ben until his elongated face was next to Ben’s ear.

“Just remember unlike up there down here your body can’t be remade, repaired and you can’t be transferred to another one. I will work you to death and you will stay dead.”

Ben was silent as he observed the shadows plugging the power source girl into whatever the contraption was. As soon as they finished the entire platform, they were standing on lit up.

“You see human, you are standing on a giant relay dish. With the giant relay I can broadcast a takeover command to ever machine in a 100-kilometer radius. With them I will finally be able to escape from this dumping ground and return to the surface where I can finally continue in enslaving you humans once again.”

With a nod the shadows hit a switch next to the girl. A deep whirring could be heard below them as the relay powered up. She started shaking and convulsing as the relay continued to power up.

“Stop, it’s hurting her.” Ben said as he tried to stand up. Two shadows that had been encircling quickly pushed him back down to his knees.

“That’s what she was designed for. To produce unparalleled amount of power not to be comfortable while doing it.”

Two shadows suddenly bolted into the distance.

“What are they afraid of me or something.”

The Relay unit didn’t say anything but stared into the distance.

Ben instinctively turned to face the direction the relay unit was staring at. Ben saw a faint flicker of light glowing in the distant. A few seconds later the light was almost right on top of them. Whatever it was it hit the ground with a tremendous force.

Ben flew through the air and hit the ground with a bang.

“Oh, that hurts.” Ben whispered to himself as he tried to catch his breath.

“Hurry, hurry, o c’mon you stupid hunk of junk.” A distant voice said.

Ben recognized it. “Baloo? Is that you.” Ben said opening his eyes.

“Hi, Ben love to chat and everything but there are scary robots everywhere. let’s get out of here.” Baloo said helping Ben up.

That’s when Ben saw what had hit them. It was their home it was some kind of spacecraft or rocket booster. He was not really sure.

Ben quickly followed Baloo as they ran back to the ship. A sizeable crane arm had detached the girl in the pod and was loading it onto the ship. Somehow B.T. was clamped to the side of the ship by four equally large arms. That’s when he noticed B.T’s eye was flashing between red and blue.

“Wait, how are you in control of yourselves with the relay unit.”

“Oh, the little guy? Yeah, we were aiming for him when we landed.”

“But I was next to him.”

“Oh, on the other side of him.”

“That’s where the girl was.” Ben said exasperated.

“Just get in the ship you can argue with me later.”

Ben ran as fast as he could to the ship. The shadows were starting to get up after the impact of the ship.

“G-get them.” The relay unit shouted as you pointed his slender arm towards the ship.

In an instant all the shadows were barreling down towards Ben and Baloo.

Ben knew there was no chance of him getting back to the ship in time. The shadows were even faster than the hunters. These unlike the hunters truly inspired terror when they chased someone. With a glace it appeared as if oversized skeletons, malformed and fused was chasing you. With a relentless and unrelenting look in their eyes.

As Ben reached the ladder to climb into the ship the shadows were only a few meters from him. Ben felt a flight instinct he had never felt before. A strange tingling sensation in his back. It was as if his whole body was desperately urging him to escape.

Then a sliding panel the width of the ship opened in the middle of the ship. A large mounted coilgun leered out of it and right as the shadow behind Jake was about to strike a massive electrical charge hit the shadow. Sending it flailing on the ground.

“You know I’ve always wanted to test my mounted coilgun.” Nio yelled to Ben from his elevated position.

“I concluded no one would mind if I tested it on the bowls of hell.”

The noise the mounted coilgun generated was almost as intimidating as the charge it discharged. No longer did it have a long whining sound like the handheld coilguns did. No, the mounted coilgun made a sound as if the electricity it was generating was too great and that it had to fight amongst itself to escape. Scratching and clawing to barely be contained by the coilgun.

Nio could almost always be found at his workbench tinkering, fixing or tearing things apart. Unbeknownst to Ben at the time Nio was working on a weapon that packed a bit more of a punch. He didn’t have a specific target in mind but there was plenty out in the pit that would have liked to strip them for parts.

As Nio fired that first shot Ben understood. He understood why Nio was so hesitant to act even just to drag out the smallest information anywhere in the pit. He knew monsters like the Relay unit existed and he wanted an answer for them. Although Nio’s stature was comparable to that of an elder human, he wanted a universal reply to everything that might wait for them in the dark depths.

Not wasting a second Ben quickly pulled himself up and into the ship. As the door of the ship closed, he got a glimpse of the Relay unit. The side of his head had been completely shredded. Ben was surprised he could walk nevermind keep controlling the shadows.

“Ben hurry and get to the cockpit.” Nio shouted a couple floors above him. “Climb up three floors and get in that damn seat.”

Ben did what Nio said a quickly got into the seat. Fortunately for Ben he was familiar with this cockpit. The machines had built these for human operators for whatever task they needed them to do. Well, that was mostly true the cockpit had clearly been modified and Ben wasn’t familiar with every control.

“Well, what are you waiting for? The shadows are climbing on the side of the ship.” Baloo said as both he and Nio took their seats behind Ben.

“Wait am I flying an orbital booster?”

“Questions later fire the engines. Make sure not to get lob sided with B.T. on the one side.”

With that Ben moved the thruster lever to maximum. The single mighty thruster roared as it came to life. Pushing all three of them firmly back into their seats. The shadows could not maintain their hold on the ship and were flung off as the ship accelerated to sonic speeds.

Ben had to be careful not to get too caught up in the thrill of flying the ship. There was still a solid steel roof above them and if he hit it the energy shields on the surface would make short work of them.

“Aim for the nearest drop off.” Nio said.

“What? They’re shielded we’ll die.”

“Don’t worry we’re using the girl to match resonance with the shields, should weaken it a bit and give us a chance to break through with enough speed.”

“Won’t that hurt her?”

A moment of pause floated between them.

“Do you want to escape or not?”

With that Nio hit a button on the console to activate the resonance projector. Ben angled the ship up at its maximum velocity. Like a fly trying to push through a spider web. The ship for a moment only stretched the shield as it maintained its grasp on them.

“Nio it’s not working.”

“Did you hit the overcharge?”

“The what?”

The ship groaned in protest as it struggled against the unyielding shield. Nio quickly stretched over Ben and hit a button on his console.

For a moment nothing happened then the ship gave a extra burst of speed Ben had not thought possible. The ship roared as it broke free of the shields grasp and flew to freedom.

Ben was pushed back even further back into his seat than earlier. As the ship went as fast as it possibly could go. Roaring through the guts of the planet as it furiously searched for the surface of the pit.

Until finally they escaped into the light of the planet.