Nightmares and Monsters

Part 8

Chapter 8.

Everyone was startled when the lights in the room flickered with a groan and banging noises above them. They all turned during a lull in the noises when the SecDef mentioned, "Gentlemen, they know the Cube is here."

Cali turned and looked at Banachek when he clicked on a button on an old intercom on the back desk. "Banachek. What's going on?" She frowned when the response came over the speaker. "Well, the NBE-One hanger has lost power..." She knew that that wasn't good to hear, especially since they had need of the energy made here at the dam to keep Megatron under ice for as long as possible. She all but ignored what Banachek said next until she heard the response. "...and the backup generator is just not gonna cut it."

At the same time as Cali growled about the backup generator, Lennox walked over to Banachek and asked him, "Do you have an arms room?"

They ran from the room with the box, into a chaotic scene right out of 'God of War 2'; the workers were fleeing in terror. Banachek yelled to anyone who would listen, "Get everyone to the NBE-One chamber now!"

Lennox and Cali were bringing up the rear and both were yelling, "Move it! Move it!" to those who were lagging behind. Cali jumped slightly when the cell phone she was carrying decided at that time to morph back into it's robot mode and started to chirp at her as they ran. Trying to run and not hit anyone she cautiously looked at the cell phone 'bot and sighed. "Ya know, you really need a name. One that stands out from all the rest." she said as it continued to chirp at her as if agreeing.

Placing the little robot close to her in her BDU Jacket pocket for safety as she ran, she heard Banachek yell as they continued towards the Armory, "They're popping our generators!"

She sighed as she thought about a good name for the little bot, she thought back to all she had learned whilst practicing her Wiccan ways, and she came up with three possible names: Anubis, Thoth, and Mithra. She weighed up the possible reasons for those names and what went through her mind was relayed to the small 'bot in her pocket on her BDU Jacket as she talked to it/him, she stared as the small 'bot crawled out of her pocket and sat in her open hands as they headed to where Lennox wanted to go with Banachek in the lead.

Anubis: Egyptian; Guardian of Isis. Jackal-headed God of Protection. Call on him to protect both home and person.

Mithra: Persian; Sun God and Bringer of Light. A Soldier's God.

Thoth: Egyptian; God of Reincarnation. Also a Moon God and favorable to Science and Wisdom.

Looking down towards the small 'bot in her hands as she mentioned each name, she weighed up the responses that it/he had for each name. When she mentioned Mithra the little bot brought out his rocket launcher, and she took that as a 'Not on your life, you crazy woman!' so she decided to try one of the other names, when she mentioned the name Thoth he completely shut down and folded into his cell phone form and a text message appeared on the small screen; 'Are you crazy!'

She shook her head as they finally reached the Armory and watched as Lennox, Epps and Burke helped to get the Assault Vehicles loaded up with guns and boxes of ammunition. She went to help but then she said to the cell phone in her hands, "So you want the name Anubis?" As if she had said the right thing, the little phone unfolded and hopped up and down in her hands chirping away. "I'll take that as a 'Yes' then." she replied as he kept jumping up and down chirruping now as if pleased to finally hear it's name.

She was heading over with Anubis the cell phone robot, to help Burke load up the 40mm Sabot Launchers with the ammunition from the secure boxes, when Anubis folded down into his phone mode as the brunette lad walked past her and grabbed Simmons. "You got to take me to my car. You have to take me to my car. He's gonna know what to do with the Cube." Cali noticed that he said 'that his car would know what to do with the Cube.' Was the lads car like Anubis? Was his car... Sentient?

Cali internally groaned as she thought about those questions for a few seconds and decided right at that point in time that she certainly didn't get paid nearly enough to deal with this sort of stuff - it was if she and her Squad had been transported to another dimension completely, where Science Fiction became Science Fact. Yep she would definitely require some extensive vacation time after all of this.

She was about to say something to Lennox about any possible time off, when she heard Simmons respond to the brunette's request to get to see his Sentient car. "Your car? It's confiscated."

"Then unconfiscate it." said the brunette as he got in Simmons' face about it.

"We do not know what will happen if we let it near this thing!" came the reply from Simmons as Cali stood and watched the exchange, with a rather curious 'bot in her hands that was also now watching the exchange.

"You don't know." said the brunette as Simmons kept on ranting now about the kids car.

"Maybe you know, but I don't know." By this point Cali wanted to just slap the man stupid and drag the kid back to his car and get the hell outta dodge, what was said next pretty much made up her mind for her as she placed her cell phone robot back into her BDU pocket and apparently Lennox thought the same as well.

"You just wanna sit here and wait and see what happens?" came the exasperated tone of the brunette, only to have Simmons turn around and respond with, "I have people's lives at stake here, young man."

Lennox grabbed Simmons by the front of his shirt and slammed him against one of the assault buggies whilst saying in a calm voice, "Take him to his car!" Cali stood besides Lennox as the pair drew their own weapons and aimed them at encroaching S7 soldiers as they tried to get to Simmons. "Drop it!" growled out Cali, thus giving the rest of the Squad the go ahead they needed to help out with the remaining S7 personnel. She smiled as she watched Sgt. Burke slam a rifle butt into two agents faces and Epps also took down another soldier not of their close-knit Squad.

"Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!" came the voice of Banachek, to Cali he was sounding a little fearful, but that could just be from the fact that they all had guns pointed at them. Simmons was apparently trying to reason with Lennox as she heard him comment, "Drop your weapon, soldier. There's an alien war going on and you're gonna shoot me?" Cali just shook her head and answered him for Lennox, "Don't tempt me or Captain Lennox right now, Simmons. This could go either way right now and you don't wanna have us all pissed off at you now."

Lennox nodded and added, "You know, we didn't ask to be here."

Apparently Simmons really didn't know when to shut his mouth and just do as the kid wanted, Cali was trying really hard at this point to not blow Simmons' brains everywhere. "I'm ordering you under S-Seven executive jurisdiction." came his smarmy yet slightly panicked reply.

"S-Seven don't exist." replied Epps, as he kept his gun trained on the other S-Seven personnel.

"Right. And we don't take orders from people who don't exist." Added Lennox as he continued to hold Simmons still at gun point. As soon as Cali heard both her fellow soldiers say their words, she smiled she fully agreed with what they had said, they really didn't take orders from people who never existed on paper.

"I'm gonna count to five. Okay." said Simmons, hoping that Lennox and the others listened to him and let them all go.

"Well, I'm gonna count to three." said Lennox as he aimed his gun with the safety off over Simmons' heart. "And I'm gonna count to two and half." responded Cali as she aimed her handgun at Simmons' head, she swore she saw his eyes widen slightly and that she saw a sweat drop form down the side of his face.

End Part 8