Murder Drones: Born from ashes

Chapter 5 : Distance

Uzi sat in her room, surrounded by empty black cases and broken weapons. The Worker Drone slumped over her work. On her desk sat a large series of tubes and wiring. Next to her was a rocket. She scrolled through thousands of documents in her visor. Following the instructions, she screwed the mechanism inside. If this worked, she could take on those things, that is if the rockets worked. It didn't mean anything to her though, if it could shoot, that was all she wanted. Vivian had been missing for days now. She had to be out there and Uzi needed a weapon that would surely kill. Everyone ignored her ever since the attack. They were all just cowards, they just wanted to hide. Those monsters didn't deserve anything but pain for what they did.

Khan sat at the dining table. He shuffled through a collection of photos before one caught his eye. It was an old one with a group of humans and drones armed with assault rifles. The group wore white jackets and kevlar vests with purple armbands wrapped around each of their left arms. Khan thought those days were behind him, but they just kept coming back. Khan then looked at the family photo. Times were simpler then.

He walked into the hallway. He entered his daughter's room. The windows were closed, the only source of light came from a makeshift LED lamp. The room had a slight smog. His time on Copper 4 taught him many things, he knew what this was.

"Hey, kid, what are you working on?" he asked. Uzi remained silent. "Listen, you shouldn't be learning about mass production until you're older. Don't you want to play with the kids outside?".

Uzi leaned further into her work. Khan stood over her desk, horrified by the sight. "A Javelin? Uziel What are you doing!?" he screamed. "It's Uzi." she muttered, not even answering her father's question.

He sighed, walked over to the outlet, and reached for the plug, Uzi acted like he wasn't even there. The heat from the soldering iron ceased. Uzi spun herself towards Khan while staring at the floor.

"Plug it back in." she said.

Khan ignored his daughter "I've been where you were before. Life is not gonna get easier if you stay here, it will only get harder." he said. "Uziel, I want you to live your life- look at me when I'm talking. Kid? Kid...? Kid are you there?"

-

Uzi snapped back to reality, they were inside one of the abandoned warships. She rubbed her hand down her neck, her fingers moving along the grooves. "Y-yeah I'm okay, I'm fine."She looked

through the snow filled munitions crates, looking for anything useful for her Javelin.

Ruger was able to check each crate with ease, simply grabbing them by the bottom and turning them over to empty them out. His arm was just like the Model 10 war drones described in the weapon document from the night market. They were used to deal with insurgents by knocking down doors, but most of the videos consisted of them breaking down closets and pummeling the test dummies that hid inside.

Their rectangular bodies along with their dinosaur like stance made them a far cry from what defined a drone now. Kale adjusted a series of dials on the side of his antenna. His visor displayed a map of Copper 9 a series of "X"s dotted the maps to signify hives in certain locations. Hives was where new Bomber Drones hid, if there was a red X, it was known as a death zone.

She continued to shovel through the box before hitting something solid. She scooped it out to find a rusted handgun. A mix of disappointment and rage welled inside her, that was it? She threw the gun against the floor, black snow spat from the gun. Kale jumped at the sound. A look of dread formed in Stacy's eyes before Ruger put a hand on her shoulder to comfort her.

"It's just Uzi, relax." said Ruger. Stacy continued her work on a door, trying to pick the lock. Uzi walked over to the 3. The lock pick snapped just as she approached.