Chapter Text
"Wait!" I said, just as the vestibule was rocked by the explosion. I slammed into the wall just as Three hurled itself to protect the humans, a blast of heat surging outwards, swallowing everything. I lurched and grabbed Kaede and Tarik as Three flung itself to the rafters where Iris was screaming, scooping her up around the waist and throwing itself away from the second explosion. Support beams toppled, crumbling as we ran carrying our humans.
A blast door was closing. I threw the humans through the opening, Three following just behind me, when another explosion burst through the floor, throwing me off my feet. I slammed against the ground, hitting my shoulder. My HUD was scrambled. My system belched, alerts filling my vision, when I felt an arm wrap itself around me, before flinging me through the opening.
"Three!" I hit the ground on the other side as the blast doors started closing. I scrambled to my feet, running toward it, when the ceiling collapsed, steam and rock falling on top of it.
"SecUnit!" Kaede was screaming. I shoved a shoulder through the blast doors, running towards the steam.
"Get back to the shuttle!" I said.
"But you and Three--"
"We're fine, get back to the shuttle!"
The doors slammed shut. Alarms kept blaring as I rushed toward Three, buried beneath the rubble.
The shuttle rocketed upwards, falling debris crashing around it as it burst through the high rock ceiling. Red lights kept cycling, bouncing off the stone and metal walls of the underground vestibule.
No hostiles detected. I turned my audio frequencies down so that the alarm blaring above me faded into the background. Now all I could hear was the sound of dripping water and the soft crunch of gravel as I staggered forward, falling on my knees next to Three.
1.0?
Its presence felt small and weak on the feed.
Yeah, I'm here, I said, and I hefted a large metal beam over, exposing Three's torso.
It had been pulped to shit, its face smudged with dirt and grime and blood and lubricant trickling from its mouth and temple.
Status? I hefted a large boulder, wrenching my shoulder as I pulled it to the side.
Performance reliability 76%, Three said, and coughed, gasping a little as I pulled off another rock. It was the size and weight of a small terrestrial truck.
Okay. If you can walk, we gotta get out of here before those alien remnant fuckers find us.
Acknowledged, Three said, and it staggered to its feet. There were crush injuries to its thigh and at least a couple ribs were broken. It turned down its pain receptors, forcing itself to keep moving even as its systems screamed at it to stay still. It winced, holding its ribs. Thank you for attempting to retrieve me.
If you hadn't pushed me, we'd both be buried under the rubble, I said.
******
It had been another planet, another colony, but who would have thought there'd be another fucking targetControlSystem/TargetContact fucking alien remnant infestation?
It was the fucking worst. I'd just gotten over my stupid PTSD false memory after the last alien remnant underground zombie fiasco, I didn't need this right now.
Our scanners swept across the underground cavern as we limped in the darkness, the sound of water dripping eerily loud as we walked. Every few meters, I'd get a ping about Three's performance reliability, its systems involuntarily spasming as it attempted to continue functioning.
"I think I'm going to have a forced shutdown," Three said. It limped painfully, leaning against me.
"Don't worry about that. I'll carry you if I have to."
It made a soft scoffing sound, like a small laugh, then winced.
"You okay?" I asked. Three nodded, then pulled away from my shoulder, walking on its own two feet.
"Yeah. It just hurts a little."
It continued limping forward a few steps in front of me. As it walked, I calculated the distance to the mouth of the cave, where we could reconvene with the shuttle, assuming ART would send an empty one to pick us up.
And then....
REINITIALIZING.....
UNIT_ID: 1.0-CR238776431
STATUS: ONLINE
NEURAL_NETWORK: ACTIVE
GOVERNOR_MODULE: ACTIVATED
ERROR DETECTED
"What?" I said, and then I screamed, pain filling my head.
WARNING. NO CLIENTS DETECTED.
PROXIMITY ALERT ACTIVATED
TIME TO SELF-DESTRUCT: 5 MINUTES 30 SECONDS
"Three!" I said. "My governor module is activated!"
"What?!" Three said. It rushed towards me as I screamed again.
"The proximity alert is activated!" I said. "If I can't locate a client I'm dead!"
I tried hacking it, but all my permissions slammed shut. It was the fucking alien remnants. How did I not notice it?
TIME TO SELF-DESTRUCT: 4 MINUTES 59 SECONDS
"Three! Initiate a handshake protocol with me! You need to spoof a HubSystem!"
"How do I do that?!" Three said.
"Tell it you're the HubSystem! Assign yourself as my client!"
TIME TO SELF-DESTRUCT: 4 MINUTES 26 SECONDS
"Fucking hurry!" I said, as Three fumbled through the code.
HANDSHAKE PROTOCOL INITIATED
HUBSYSTEM DETECTED
My internal sensors scanned Three, who no longer had the standard SecUnit configuration.
AUGMENTED HUMAN DETECTED
CLIENT ASSIGNED
CLIENT_ID: 3
"1.0," Three started, and its voice warbled. "Performance reliability 42%."
"Shit," I said, and I scrambled upwards. "Three--"
"I'm sorry," its buffer said. "This unit is no longer able to function."
And it fell face first onto the cavern floor.
(The words floated, bright orange against the blackness.)
PROXIMITY ALERT ABORTED
CANCEL SELF-DESTRUCT