Latch unto Me

Galahad

Kyle felt tense.

The dusty streets felt watched. No Sensor pads in the grounds blared, no mines detonated, no buried ambush bots, no snipers in the rafters, no airstrike guides, no orbital strike markers, no paratroopers, no long range artillery bombardment, no War-machine airdrops, no napalm blanket, not even a battalion of soldiers. Nothing.

Did he expect too much? He expected something; anything. But not a single living or mechanical thing sprung.

They finished sweeping the main street which ran through the hundred meter long ghost town.

"Alright, looks like all the roads are clear Val. We're going inside some of the buildings now." Kyle whispered into his helmet mic.

It took the better part of an hour to search each and every building, but they where efficient, and most of the structures where single room storage shacks. They contained dusty boxes of basic materials, tools and other domestic equipment.

"Still nothing outside Val?"

"De nada."

"Alright. Looks like we're clear. This place really is a ghost town." Kyle confirmed.

"Some of these storage containers have intact cryogenics food. At least we wont starve." Jack noted.

"As long as it isn't all in one flavour." Val's voice came over the comm's.

"You should get down here." Kyle told her. He turned to Jack as he heard his shout of surprise.

Everyone raised their weapons to see he had pulled the cover off of an old MEC. Not any advanced war machine, but an industrial platform. They lowered their weapons, and Julia approached it.

Brushing and blowing dust off of its service information, she shook her head gently.

"This machine is marked 2124. That's nearly seven centauries old. How is that possible?"

"Seven Centauries? Are you sure? I thought MEC's where developed only two centauries ago." Kyle asked.

"Yeah, only two." Jack laughed.

"Read it for yourself." She said, ignoring Jacks interjection, then proceeded to read aloud the notice, "Service check, 148th rotation, 2124. Full left armature replacement and frame reconstruction complete. Unit ready for transit to AS4C at 0800 hours on the 151st rotation. Handle with care."

"Handle with care? Do they think its made of glass?" Jack spluttered, then laughed again.

"Can we turn it on?" Kyle raised an eyebrow.

"Power leakage detected in lower fission cell. Radiation levels degraded, likely due to long dissipation duration. Heavy machine platform will be unable to initialize any form of powering protocol; Target threat, Zero."

Everyone jumped at Xenon's loud analysis.

"Thanks Xenon." Jack huffed sarcastically. It gave only a low pitched buzz in response.

"Could we fix it?" Kyle looked to Julia.

"Scanning for potential replacement materials. Stand by." Everyone jumped again, Jack swore.

"Three viable instances of; Fission cell, have been found within one hundred meters. Authorize location and retrieval required."

"Uh, permission granted?" Kyle stuttered. Xenon gave another low pitched buzz, and hovered away. He looked from the doorway it exited, back to Julia. "It can pick shit up?"