Cyber Stories

Chapter 3: And then there were three...

Rumble POV:

Uneasy silence engulfed the interior of the base. After the initial firefight, we found no resistance, not a single bot in sight.

"Well ain't this cozy..." Plunder muttered sarcastically, "Where's all the fighting?"

The hanger we had entered through was relatively well kept, these dark hallways were decrepit and desolate. Crates that were once stacked lay scattered across the floors, tables overturned, doors hanging from their frames.

The walls were covered in oddly snapped scorch marks. Curving, erratic lines of black char traced across the metal in multiple overlapping strokes. Kaz ran his fingers along the scorch marks, racking his processor to identify what could create them in such a bizarre pattern.

"Easy kid," I spoke softly to him, "Calm processor, focused optics."

Kaz nodded, repeating the statement to himself at a whispered volume as the group moved forward.

"What's th' matter Junior?" Plunder whispered tauntingly, "Not gonna get all jumpy on me, a'ya?"

Something hit the floor to the right, Plunder whipping around and firing a barrage of shots. After a second of silence and several glances from the group, Plunder quickly composed himself and lowered his blasters.

After an unimpressed glance at the mech, I stepped forward and shone my light on the object that had fallen. It was a simple power tool, not nearly large enough to make a sound like we had heard unless it was dropped from a decent height.

Ruvik must have had the same thought, he and I both trailing our flashlight beams up the wall and searching the high ceiling.

Nothing.

"Yes yes, we get it. Spooky," Nagisa spoke up, walking past us, "Let's go find more stuff to kill."

Ruvik and I shared a look, another non-verbal sibling communication. This dragon was bad news. He was likely to lead us on a destructive path very quickly if we didn't keep an optic on him.

Our squad moved forward into the dark, ruined hallways, Ruvik guiding us with a map given to him by the instructor.

After what seemed like hours of wandering in the shadows, we reached the end of the map trail. A sealed blast door.

Searching the wall with my flashlight, I took note of the vent cover we were told to look for, pointing it out to my brother.

"Gypsy was supposed to be here," he responded, referring to the only real reason Gypsy was put in our group, her being the most... slender femme in the Facility.

"Guess I could try," Flow spoke up, "Unless one of you strapping hunks wanna squeeze your broad ass shoulders in there."

Fair point, I suppose.

"Masky, give her a boost," Ruvik instructed Nagisa, who was spinning a knife in his claws until he was addressed.

The dragon stepped forward and reared up, resting his front paws on the wall and giving Flow a perfect ramp up about three quarters of the wall's height.

The biped femme backed up a few steps and got a bit of a running start to jump up and begin climbing Nagisa's back.

"First time riding a dragon?" he commented, "Once you do, you'll never go back."

Flow gave him a well earned heel kick to the helm, the dragon chuckling and barely flinching even with her sharp force, then she resumed her climb until reaching the vent cover.

She tugged it loose and handed it down to Ruvik, then hoisted herself up and shimmied inside. After a few minutes, the blast door opened and the femme stepped out looking proud of herself.

"Nice work," Ruvik commented, "Kaz, do your thing."

The young mech headed into the small room, going straight to a wiring panel and fiddling with everything. I watched as Flow backed up a few steps, suddenly whipping around and glancing around the dark room.

Before I could ask what she was doing, a bright flash of blue light streaked across the ceiling, in the rafters. Flow turned just as a bolt of electricity shot at her from the darkness above.

Her servos instinctively shot up as if expecting to catch the beam of electricity, but surprisingly as she flicked her arms to the side, the bolt redirected to curve around her and hit the floor, creating a char streak that instantly looked familiar.

The femme was fast, I'll give her that.

Before she could even look up to reposition for another attack, the blue light returned. Everything slowed, my vision shimmering a faint blue-ish hue, just slightly.

It was like someone hit the slow-motion button, every bot around me moving so slow they practically stood still. But something else was moving.

A huge bolt of electricity, massive enough to encase a full grown biped entirely, moving at about half of real time speed as it stretched from the ceiling to the floor, moving right through Flow.

I could swear I saw an arm with long claws, shaped from pure electricity, reaching from the bolt to Flow's chest.

Then everything corrected. Time returned to normal, and Flow stood stiff and still.

After a moment, energon began leaking from a diagonal cut on her midriff. Then she fell to her knees, her form sliding into two halves.

"What the fuck...?" Ruvik exclaimed, rifle already aimed and wings raised. I stood stunned, less so by the death of someone I barely knew and more by the strange experience.

A snarl filled the room, a guttural hiss that reverberated until rattling to a quiet. Optics appeared in the darkness behind the remains of Flow.

Gunshots snapped me out of my shock, Plunder aimlessly firing on the creature. The thing responded by vanishing in another bright flash. Within moments we heard scratching and clambering sounds moving across the rafters towards us.

Plunder fired blindly at the rafters with his two pistols, screaming obscenities that didn't sound like English, but the tone came through regardless.

When the sounds reached his position, the creature lunged down from the rafters with staggering speed, lashing its claws across Plunder's faceplate and forcing the biped to his knees.

Immediately it followed up with its tail, stabbing a long jagged blade through his chest and yanking him upward into the darkness above us. His screams stopped a moment after.

Kaz rejoined us in the room, Ruvik pulling him with us as he ushered us quickly towards the only open door we could see.

The creature singled me out, staring into my optics. I could almost see intrigue behind those savage optics, causing me to hesitate until Ruvik shouted my name.

Spurred from my questions, I opened fire on the creature, watching as it easily danced around my shots and retreated to the rafters once more.

Sure enough, the sounds came thundering after us as we rushed to the door, Ruvik yanking Nagisa through as he was watching the rafters with an excited grin.

Once I was through, Kaz typed away on the keypad, hacking past the security measures and slamming it shut, just in time for us to hear claws scraping on the metal.

"That was way too close..." he muttered, voice shaking a bit.

"Good job in there kid," I reassured him.

Suddenly, the doors jerked open, just enough for an arm to reach the young biped. I lunged to catch him, too late to prevent the claws from reaching him and slamming him roughly against the doors as they tried to close.

I took hold of his arm, trying to pull him back, but with a harsh bellow from the creature Kaz was drawn back into the closing doors.

As the hydraulics kicked into emergency mode, thanks to Kaz's tinkering, they forced themselves shut on the kid, crushing his helm and severing his arm.

I fell back a bit at the release of tension, staring in disbelief at the energon dripping from the sealed blast doors.

Kaz was the closest thing to innocent you would find at the facility. He had hope. Hope of being better.