Chapter Text
A small figure walked tirelessly through the wastelands. Its small size appeared even smaller compared to the vast and rocky emptiness around it. Its path remained unchanging, unfaltering.
Until.
White light flashed in the black lines of its masklike face-plate, and it stopped for a moment, before picking up the pace, still moving towards the same destination but with a renewed purpose. Its movements slightly less robotic, fueled by someone with emotion, something that the best of AIs still couldn't truly replicate without organic help.
They ran and jumped and climbed as best they could, nowhere as good as a real fighter, but much better than a child that age would be able to naturally. If they were a child. They were built like one, but it was hard to tell without a face to judge by.
An old billboard flickered to life as they walked past it, and they stopped to read it. It was an advertisement for Hallowtech, which claimed to be the greatest and longest-lived technological empire.
They kept walking until they were met with a clumsily made barricade, which did nothing to stop them. They pried apart and shoved aside the wedged-together pieces of scrap metal, and stepped into the town that the barricade so futilely guarded.
To call it a suburb would have been extremely generous. Although it was on the outskirts of the city, it could only be a village at most. Most of the buildings were boarded up, the lights flickered, and only one person could be seen: an old man with a prosthetic leg that, if the paint hadn't been worn off with time, would have looked like any other pristine piece of Hallowtech. He wore a horned motorcycle helmet with the visor up so that his face could be seen, and it seemed like he was wearing it more as an accessory or a signifier of a position rather than for defense.
The elder informed the small wanderer that everyone in town had left- gone to seek their fortunes in Rain City and the surrounding areas. None had come back.
But despite this warning, the wanderer knew that was where they needed to go.
The corner of the megacity nearest to the village was mostly abandoned, and still retained the older style of simple asphalt roads and skyscrapers long-forgotten. No neon lights or computerized patterns, just plain streetlights and traffic-lights that flickered a little, not having been maintained in the absence of people. The only life, aside from a few vines and dandelions, were the small animals that scurried without fear across the streets and between buildings, rats and raccoons and anything like that, which likes to make its home where people are and will continue living there once they're gone.
When the creatures got too close, the little wanderer deployed a triangular blade from their right arm. The pests didn't stand a chance, each dying in one or two hits. Although the weapon was quite beat-up and even a little chipped, the wanderer certainly knew how to use it. They must have gotten some practice out in the Wastelands, although they didn't remember anything in particular from that time. (This probably should have bothered them more, but they were on a mission. They had a goal, even if they didn't totally understand what it was. They didn't need to stop and think about the past.)
They sheathed their weapon when they encountered a living being that was decidedly not a rodent or raccoon. It was a man, sitting in the broken second-floor window of a skyscraper and humming to himself. His face was covered by a gas mask and goggles, and the floor in front of him was covered in various objects, including a drone controller, a tablet, and a few sheets of actual paper. The wanderer paced for a moment below the window, before realizing that there was probably a way to reach that level inside the building. They ran inside and up a flight of stairs, than walked up behind the other person and tapped him on the shoulder.
The stranger was not as startled as he might have been, probably having heard the wanderer walking up to him. "Hmm?" He asked, still half not paying attention, adjusting the flight path of his drone and taking notes. "Have you come to explore these old ruins? Don't mind me. I've a fondness for exploring, myself." Again he picked up the controller and fiddled with the buttons for a moment, then zoomed in on something on his tablet. "I'm working on mapping this area, right now. Would you like to buy a copy of my work so far? I'll warn you, it's not exactly complete. But it's a better map than anyone else has of this old area!"
The wanderer nodded, and pulled out some coins from their messenger bag.
"Excellent, now would you like that in paper or downloaded?" The map-maker asked. "Download is much more convenient, but paper's good for if you're worried about data corruptions- not that my maps are particularly susceptible, of course, but you know how the times are."
The wanderer didn't necessarily know how the times were, but they didn't say anything, instead tapping the USB port on their arm.
"Alright. Now when I said that the map is unfinished, I meant that it's all just overhead photos at this point." The map-maker elaborated. "If you want to get it hooked up to a GPS tracker, you'll have to ask my wife Iselda, she should be at our shop in Dirtmouth. My name's Cornifer, by the way."
If Cornifer had been expecting the wanderer to respond with their own name, he would have been disappointed. They accepted the map but remained silent, and walked away as soon as the interaction was over.
A GPS sounded great, but the wanderer (CV102, as they noticed the tattoo on their left arm said) had used up all their money purchasing the map. They'd need to venture further in and find more.
Soon they were approached by someone else, an ordinary-looking person in a sleek but drab outfit of blue and gray. Something was off, though. Something about the way they walked, maybe. Or maybe how the wire pattern on the augment-chip in their head was glowing orange. To be fair, 102 hadn't seen many people before this, at least not that they could remember, but something about it seemed wrong. Instinctively, they unsheathed their blade as the orange-lit human staggered towards them and reached out its arms as if to grab them. 102 ducked under the arms and delivered a couple slashes to the stranger's chest, causing it to fall down. After waiting and observing for a moment, 102 concluded that the stranger was dead.
They had just killed a guy. They weren't quite sure how to feel about that.
Eventually they decided that it must have been a good decision, since whoever-it-was had been trying to grab them, and besides, maybe now they could grab any money their opponent had had on them.
Besides. They really didn't like that orange.
As they progressed further into the abandoned city, they were met with more and more of those guys- some with glowing eyes, some with holoscreens that projected from their faces, some with nothing more than a sleek piece of plastic and LEDs just above their eyebrows, but all glowing orange. The little cyborg ran past them where they could, and killed when necessary. More often than not, the cyborg also stopped to loot coins, but they never stopped long enough for the orange ones to swarm them. By this point 102 was certain that something was going on, and the orange was more than just a poor aesthetic choice. That much was clear from the fact that they all tried to attack 102 as soon as they saw them. Some of the enemies did manage to score some hits, as the medical display in the corner of 102's vision indicated, but they just focused some of their spare electrical energy to speed up the healing process. One of the perks of being an entire 50% robot.
(Or, possibly more than that? It was unclear.)
Eventually, they reached a building that was lower than the others, only one or two floors tall, and made out of a dark material. Carved above the doorway were three stylized masks or face-plates, teardrop-shaped with strange numbers of eyes: one, four and six. They stepped inside only to see that it was almost completely empty, except for a smooth, black, egg-shaped pod with those same mask shapes indented into it. They were glowing: the one-eyed mask with blue light, the four-eyed mask with green, and the six-eyed mask with purple. A control panel encased in the same smooth, black material sat in front of it.
This was it, this was the place they were looking for. They didn't know what was in it, nor how to open it, but the signal they had been receiving ever since they'd been within sight of the city, was coming from here.
They were not the only one staring up at the- for lack of a better name- Black Egg. There was another stranger, looking just like an average human to the little cyborg, maybe slightly taller than most of the ones they'd killed, with a bit of dark hair peeking out from under his dark blue beanie. What 102 found strange about this particular stranger was (other than the fact that he wasn't attacking them) that he seemed to be wearing two hats at once. First the beanie, then on top of that some large mask with faintly glowing green wires coming off of it that (presumably) acted as a makeshift helmet.
The cyborg tugged on the sleeve of the stranger's faded blue jacket to get his attention.
"Hello there!" The stranger seemed startled, but his attitude quickly changed to enthusiasm. "How delightful to meet another traveler on these forgotten roads! You're small, but you've got a strong look about you..." It almost sounded like he was talking more to himself than to 102, the way he made these observations. Then he seemed to remember that he was talking to someone. "I'm Quirrel. I have something of an obsession with uncharted places. This city holds many mysteries, and one of the most intriguing stands right in front of us!" In talking about the mystery of the Black Egg, Quirrel slipped back into thinking out loud. "A pod with three seals, in a building dedicated entirely to it. And- is it humming slightly? It is certainly something..."
102 decided that they liked this guy. He didn't try to kill them, like all the orange ones did, and he was a lot more optimistic than the old guy back in- Dirtmouth? Was that the town's name?
"Can it be opened?" They heard Quirrel say as they walked away. "The control panel's writing is unusual... I wonder what other marvels await further into the city..."
After going back and receiving the GPS from Iselda, 102 decided to explore further. They knew that whatever they needed was inside that Black Egg, but it was locked. They had tried to break it open with their blade, but it had just bounced off of the material without leaving a scratch, and chipped the blade further. They really needed to get that fixed.
Pretty soon they came to an extremely overgrown part of the city. Perhaps there had once been a park or garden, which had gotten out of hand. Trees, bushes and vines all sprouted from the cracks in the moss-covered asphalt, entangling themselves with the remains of the buildings, simultaneously tearing them apart and holding them up. Hidden behind some of this intruding shrubbery was a Baldur X, a tough, armored machine originally meant for demolition. It was sitting square in the middle of the road. 102 figured they'd be able to climb over it easily, but as they approached, it lit up. Orange light shone from its cracks, and it shot balls of sparking orange energy towards them. They were frozen in place for a moment after one hit, but recovered quickly, unsheathing their blade and charging at it. A blue force-field flickered into place just as they were about to reach the machine, and they ran into it, almost falling backwards before catching themselves. At least this meant it couldn't shoot at them anymore, but it didn't exactly make it any easier to get through. This route was completely blocked, for now.
Heading back in the other direction, 102 found something they had missed the first time. A shop on the lowest floor of a building, covered in graffiti scribblings of flames and animal skulls. Its cobbled-together neon sign glowed a mix of orange, pink and purple, reminiscent of a sunset, and declared the place to be "Snail Shack: Energy Weapons and Upgrades". Well, that certainly looked like what they needed: if not an energy weapon, than an upgrade would absolutely be welcome! They sprinted inside.
"Ohoho!" The shopkeeper, an individual with a hood over their head, shading their face except for two augmented, glowing eyes, laughed as soon as the cyborg walked in through the door. "Who is that, creeping out of the darkness?" The shopkeeper stood up from their seat and strode over to take a closer look. "Myyy, you're looking grim! A strange, empty face and a wicked-looking weapon!"
The blade was still retracted into the cyborg's arm, not visible. The shopkeeper must really have been an expert to tell at a glance the arm's secret function, and the quality of it.
"Something has drawn you into the corpse of this city, but I won't ask what." The shopkeeper continued. "Perhaps the reason you've found me is because you need my help? You can call me Snam, by the way. Like 'Sam', with an 'N'."
102 nodded emphatically. They absolutely needed help if they were going to go any further.
"Say no more, friend," Snam answered, going back behind a desk and rummaging around in a drawer for something. "I'm going to give you a gift. A nasty little device of my own creation." He finally found what he was looking for, and flourished the small device over his head before pacing quickly back over to 102. "It's just perfect for a little one like you! Ohoho!" He grabbed the cyborg's weapon arm, and pressed a few buttons and unscrewed a few panels before sliding the device into place, muttering all the while. "Shouldn't be too hard for you to get a handle on, of course... just a basic secondary function, it'll be like the difference between moving a finger and a thumb. Hold on, almost wired in- there!"
When Snam shouted "There!" the last two wires of the device plugged into 102's mechanical arm, and the whole thing lit up white for a moment. A moment is about how long the young cyborg watched their new upgrade with awe as well, because a split second later, they were overwhelmed with pain as electricity arced through them, too much to handle, and they blacked out.
They woke up lying on the floor of a cage. Sitting up (the ceiling of the cage was too low for them to stand), they saw Snam resting in a chair beside them, and put two and two together. They slowly slid the blade from its sheath in their arm, hoping not to make too much noise, but as soon as it collided with the side of the cage, Snam was alerted by the noise and woke up.
"Oh! You've woken at last! I apologize, I should have warned you about the power of that weapon! I was watching over you as you slept, but seem to have slipped off myself. Ohohoho!"
That laugh was really starting to annoy them. They tapped the side of the cage as if to say 'ok but what's the cage for?' It wasn't as aggressive of a motion as they'd have liked to make, but the cage didn't leave much room for swinging a blade properly.
"Now you're awake, I was wondering if you'd do me a small favor. -Not as repayment for my gift, of course, but because we're now friends."
They would have been just slightly happier with the situation if it was framed as repayment. At least that would be somewhat fair, seeing as 102 hadn't actually paid the guy for the upgrade.
"You see, a horrid great machine has made its home in the alley just out my back door. How rude of it! I would be quite grateful if you ventured back there and slayed it for me."
It didn't look like they had much of a choice, as Snam wheeled the cage over to his back door on a cart and opened the door, shoving the cage (and with it, 102) outside.
"With your new power you'll be more than a match for it!" He shouted after 102 as they extricated themselves from the now broken cage. "Good luck with this small favor, my friend! Ohohohohoho!"
If 102 had known any swear words, they would have thought all of them.