Reboot: A Hybrid's Odyssey

Chapter 4: Out of the Shadows

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The smell of conchas lingered through the air, and Stephanie perked up. Stephanie lifted her head from where she was sleeping, noticing she was in a large bakery empty of people, but she recognized the familiar smell. The smell of baked goods ranged from brazo gitano, buñuelo, and crema catalana.

"Wait, I recognize that smell!" Stephanie perked in realization. "Those smell like how my..." Her eyes widened in shock. "No... it can't be..."

"¡Hija!" a woman's voice called, catching Stephanie's attention as she glanced towards the bakery's backroom. "¡Se terminaron los productos horneados! ¡Ven a probar el sabor más nuevo que se nos ocurrió!"

"¡Bien!" Stephanie called back, instantly pushing her chair back, and headed towards the kitchen as fast as she could, opening the door to the back. She excitedly opened the door and entered the bakery's back room, where the oven and cooking—or magic—happened. The sudden smell of copper filled the air, and she gagged, covering her mouth with her hand.

To her horror, she saw two corpses lying on the ground, along with an unknown third with a robot standing on the kitchen counter in the center. When Stephanie entered the bakery's backroom, the robot perked and turned around on its heel, its movements automatic and synchronized, even stiff and slow.

The robot resembled an Engineer-bot, holding something on a plate in both hands with something on top of it. The robot stepped towards Stephanie, who was frozen and staring at the Engineer-bot, her eyes filled with fear and confusion.

"There you are, hijita," the Engineer-bot responded, holding the plate towards Stephanie. "Look at what the new flavor is!" On the plate was the head of the BLU Medic, his eyes blank of life and halfway rolled back. The silver platter was soaked from his blood, leaking from the surface and dripping on the floor. "The flavor of the BLU Medic."

Stephanie's hands were covered with blood as well when she lifted her hands, and her jaw was covered with blood as well, seeing bite marks across the BLU Medic's body behind the Engineer-bot, whose jaws were covered with blood with the BLU Medic's head on the silver platter.

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Stephanie instantly woke up with a bolt from the ground, gasping deeply before coughing, realizing something was lodged within her chest. She coughed hard, feeling something rising from her chest. The lodged object rose higher and higher before soon hacking out something rectangular, which landed on the ground with a slight clatter covered with jet-black mucus.

But it did not stop there. Stephanie then gave out a sharp but loud blech, watching a puff of blue smoke with plus signs in it launch out of her mouth before disappearing. She gasped and slammed her metallic hand over her jaws, horror hitting her like a sledgehammer. She looked down at her stomach but perked up when she realized it looked smaller than before.