Bionica: The War

Alone

Eclipse had grabbed the girls and run. Sprocket and the other boy were left amid the gunshots and shouting. Sprocket was confused. Should he leave him? No, that wouldn't be right. But he couldn't run that far carrying another human. Then again, the rebel was scrawny, with not much muscle. And he looked so helpless, lying there and clutching his stomach.

Sprocket grabbed him.

And he ran like hell.

He imagined it was a test back at the lab. If he survived the spray of bullets constantly whizzing past him, he could rest for the remainder of the day. He might even be able to have some food. And if he could somehow find the rebel base, his reward would be even greater: a warm place to sleep, hot food, and people to help him with whatever he needed. He just needed to figure out how to do it.

Finally, after what seemed like hours, Sprocket stopped to listen. He didn't hear any gunshots or shouting, so he decided to rest. He propped the boy against a random boulder and looked at him. Blood soaked his shirt, centered around a point just to the right of his navel. His skin was incredibly pale, not unlike a monster Sprocket had once heard of that sucked blood and withered in the sunlight. He shifted his weight and looked at Sprocket. "I'm going to die here, aren't I?"

Sprocket was quick to respond. "No, no! You just need to tell me which way the base is, that's all. I can get you back there, get you some help... I can fix this..."

The rebel winced as he chuckled. "I'll tell you as soon as you figure out where we are."

He was right. Where were they? Sprocket had never been outside the lab before. What did he know about the lay of the land? How did he expect to get home? What if he died here? At least I'll die a free man, he thought.

But what about the boy?

No, he had to make it back to the rebel base. With his mind made up, he looked at the scrawny teenager clutching his side. "Do you have any form of communication with the rebels? Anything at all?"

The boy's hand went to his ear. It came back with an earpiece. A spring-like cord ran from it to a battery pack sitting on his collar. Sprocket hurriedly put on the comlink. "Hello?" he said frantically. "Can anyone hear me?"

Static. Then a voice came through. "Skillet?" asked a girl. "Are you all right?"

All right, so now if this guy died, Sprocket knew who he was. "I'm not Skillet," he replied. "My name's Sprocket. I'm one of the three escapees from U. S. Laboratory Five. Skillet's with me, but he's been shot, and he's losing blood fast. We need you to help us get back safely."

"Umm... okay..." said the girl. She was frantic. "Let me connect you with HQ. They may be able to help."

"Hurry!"

"And just so you know, I'm with the other two escapees. They're fine."

Sprocket was relieved. Riley and Rose were okay. "Thanks. I'll try and get Skillet back to you."

The comlink spurted static for a few seconds as Skillet grabbed Sprocket's wrist. "Listen," he said, "you have to tell them who I am."

"No," Sprocket said. "We're going to get you back. You're going to live."

"No, I'm not," said Skillet. "It's not statistically possible. You have to tell them my name."

His name? "I thought it was Skillet."

"That's my nickname. We give them to ourselves and withhold our real names so if the government asks about one of us, we can honestly say we don't know who they are. Tell them... tell them I'm-"

"Come in, escapee," said an older male voice. "This is HQ. We're going to help you get back to base."

Sprocket jumped to his feet. "Great!" he exclaimed. "My name's Sprocket. I'm sorry about all this."

"Don't worry about it," said the voice. "Just make sure Skillet gets home safe. I'm Ironworks Bradley, the rebel leader. Do you know where you are?"

"No," admitted Sprocket. It all looked like desolate wasteland to him.

"Okay," said Ironworks. "You have a government tracking chip in your robotic spine."

Sprocket was creeped out now. "How'd you know I have a metal back?!"

"Like I said, you have a tracking chip in it. I'm going to have one of my men hack into it and show us where you are, then we'll send a response team out for you. Got it?"

"But what about Skillet?" asked Sprocket.

"We'll send medical personnel. Good luck." Ironworks' voice cut off and Sprocket was left standing there with more questions. Why not just bring him to base? How fast would they get here? What should he do to keep Skillet alive?

"Sprocket?"

Another voice came over the intercom. It was a girl, maybe a bit younger than he was. "My name's Magnet. I'm a technician with the rebels, and I'm going to help get you two out of there. The first thing I need to know is whether there were any other human bionics experiments on file when you escaped."

Sprocket answered almost robotically. "There were two girls. One has a robotic leg, the other has a robotic hand."

"Thanks," said Magnet. Then she started talking quietly to herself. "So I have three options for serial numbers. I'll just pull those up..." There was some clacking over the comlink, and Sprocket figured she was typing on a keyboard. "Just so you know, Sprocket, I'm going to have to hack the government databases, which are sort of sensitive to intruders. This is going to have to go fairly quickly." She kept clacking and whispering to no one. "So the serial numbers on the chips start with their date of acquisition, but we don't know when they were captured. Then it's eleven random numbers which mean something I don't know. After that should be their sex, which means there are two F's and one..."

Another click. "I'm into your chip. You're not very far from the rebel base; we'll send people out there to get you. The government people are also probably after you, so stay alert. Don't move Skillet if you don't have to and make sure he's breathing. See you soon."

And just like that, she was gone.

Sprocket turned back to Skillet, who seemed to be getting paler and paler as time wore on. His breaths were more shallow, and blood had started to pool around him. He looked up at Sprocket. "Can you... come closer?" Sprocket did as he asked. "I need to tell you... my name."

"You don't have to," said Sprocket. "They're sending people to help you right now."

But Skillet had an urgent look in his eyes. "I don't have very long. I can feel it. You have to know."

There was a low roar in the distance. Sprocket looked up and saw a large pickup truck with a bed big enough to hold at least six people sitting down. He tried to stand up and wave, but Skillet grabbed his wrist and pulled him down.

"Jonathan Cooper."

The truck pulled up and people rushed out of it. One of them went to check Skillet's pulse. "Nothing." She pulled out a walkie-talkie. "Syphen, you're going to want to be here." Then she turned back to Sprocket. "Did he say anything to you?"

Sprocket just stood there for a few seconds. Finally, the words came out. "His name was Jonathan Cooper."