Revult

The walls reverberated the sorrows of his apathy. The cold steel floor clinked sporadically against his feet as the craft jolted, or so he imagined through the artifice of his figure. Slowly, he turned his arms. Quickly, he moved his hands, flicking the levers and switches as required by the precise adjustments. Although acumen perfected, his craft creaked with every movement. Relatively short on resources, he piloted a dingey vessel devoid of autopilot navigation; why spend more, when his competence can proceed accordingly?

An orange hue engulfed the craft as he throttled up through the sky. Exiting the atmosphere, he departed E-3. Some lingering urge of the subconscious resisted, yet relished, as he manually reangled the craft towards his target destination. With nothing but open space before him, he manually initiated the hyperwarplightspeedspace drivers.

White flashes streaked by as he was slammed back into the seat. The lights, which some may call pretty, held no impact in his heart, for he had no heart. There was nothing he could do as his mind clicked and clacked away. With thoughts repressed, the program, installed inside, continued its diligent task. After many moments, the vessel departed from hyperwarplightspeedspace. The white flashes gradually bled back into dots, all except for the ones that vanished into the dark mass that blotted space.

With his grip of steel, he swooped his rickety vessel into the blot. On a screen to his left a radial arm circled, blipping as it passed over a green speck. The metallic hatred buzzed from within, with each revolution of the arm. He swiveled the vessel, skirting until the blip rested on the edge of the screen, then descended his craft. With the landing procedure concluded, he extended the ramp and emerged onto the brackish rocks, blackened by the flow of blood and time.

During the brief reprieve that was their time in the shuttle, the three yapped their complaints at each other, grumbling over the numerous disgruntles of the day, though after mere minutes they had arrived at their destination, where they swiftly entered a secret entrance to the underground tunnels of the city, rode via motorized unicycle to another secret location, where they stashed the cycles, then proceeded on foot through the even more abandoned tunnels of the old district, whereupon they surfaced and eventually reached Jebediah’s “secret abandoned military bunker”.

The “bunker” lay barren, seemingly abandoned amidst the rubble of the old district. Broken fragments of the segmented walls lay scattered in front of its façade. The irodinium door was clearly crumbling. Shards of glass, from nearby buildings’ shattered windows, littered the streets. Debris and trash blew by with each gust of wind.

“Can’t believe people used to live here,” Isaiah admired the cityscape, full of toppled skyscrapers and unparalleled unparalleledness (‘cept for the twisting expanse that they call the new city).

“Looks like a whole ‘nother planet,” Samuel concurred.

With one last scan of his radar and a quick glance over his shoulder, Jebediah walked forward and slowly bypassed the cylindrical locking mechanism of the door, a final means of fortification, albeit merely useless amidst the wreckage.

“You’re telling us… this… is your secret bunker?” Samuel stared at Jebediah.

“Home sweet home,” he grunted in return. “Old military did some things right at least.”

“There’s literally a hole in the wall! I think I could even squeeze through that!” Isaiah walked up and began sticking his head through the hole.

“Quiet down, and quit it with that complainin’. Can’t make too much noise from now on, just in case,” Jebediah yanked Isaiah’s shaggy head back. “Haven’t been here in a while. It can be repaired, not too much though, and it’s better than nothing while we’re off the grid.”

Speaking of nothing, inside, nothingness lined its halls in its barren, abandoned, decrepit state. The trio met this sight after all three of them worked together to slide the door open on its pin-less hinges.

“At least it looks better on the inside.”

Jebediah ignored Isaiah’s sarcasm and walked down the long stretch. “We’ll have to clear it out, but enough room to launch.” He turned to the side, entered the small office space. This too was barren. Jebediah walked towards the sole intact, upright, normal, object in the room. A lone bookshelf, with a singular book on it. With a gentle pull on the spine the shelf slowly slid… yeah, I’m not that dumb. Instead, Jebediah passed the shelf and led the way to the actual entrance of the secret chamber within the secret bunker. With the pushing of another (less damaged) irodinium door and the shove of a fake floor, he unveiled their living and prepping quarters for the next few days. After a brief repose, Jebediah showed them around the laboratory, workshop, and components storage.

For days they worked attentively. They would have taken it in shifts and established a guard if they could, but time was of the essence. Regardless, thermal imaging that cyborg scouts may be using made just about any foray onto the surface out of the picture.

In the dingy darkness they toiled, restless and sleepless. They had narrowly escaped conglomerate headquarters with their lives intact and had no time for tact of escape secrecy. Who knows how far the cyborgs traced them or how close they were to finding them.

The rocks clacked beneath his feet. The darkness welcomed him, embraced him, cooled his mind with the light tingle of a breeze. Somehow the surface was grimly illuminated through the thick black clouds which rolled overhead.

With a quick glance at his scanner, he began making his way towards the blipping speck of green. From boulder to boulder, he went. There was nothing to soften the harsh clanging of metal and rock – except for the occasional puddle of oil, which he steered clear of due to the threat to his circuitry – as he jostled across the wasteland; no dirt, no sand, no nothing. The complete lack of life sparked some ancient remembrance from within; a sole quotation deemed genuine amidst a myriad of artificed thoughts: Nothing good comes from the dust. Yet in its own way, that quotation controlled him, gave way for the control. Ragefully calm; apathetically empathetical.

The blip of green transposed from the screen to reality as he stumbled upon a vessel. He ran his hands along its side. The blaster-singed surface creaked beneath his fingers, the scrape of steel on steel. The entrance ramp was lowered, so he boarded the vessel. Inside, lights flashed. He approached the control panels. A faint warning cyclically hummed: Warning, warning, vertical stabilizer damaged, oil critically low. Flight ill-advised. On another screen, a radar twirled, blipping on a green dot, his ship. Another screen displayed a topographical map; a similar blipping symbol indicating a colony.

The mind absorbed the information, and yet again, he was out on the rocks. Not long after, he reached the edge of a valley. Jumping down, his feet slammed onto a black path, sending its gravel tumbling down the hill.

Far below, on the valley floor, three shadows slinked along. His focus narrowed, optics scanned the situation, computed his course of action. From within his chest cavity, he produced two rubber silencer soles and strapped them onto his iron hunks. After checking his blaster for full charge, he released the safety.

A sudden burst of reddish-orange flared up, illuminating the three distant figures. His optics scanned, simultaneously igniting the blaze within his mind.

From a whisper to a roar, the voices reinvaded his mind. “The mission . . . the mission . . . the mission,” the voices whisperoared around him.

“The mission . . . the mission . . . the mission,” he heard his voice amongst them; the sole objective took hold of him.

His mind and body contorted beneath the pressure. He stumbled, scrabbling down the path. Metal screeched as he tumbled down the rocks. Upon landing on the valley floor, his feet left him no reprieve, immediately up-righting him. They carried him off over the boulders; the blaze grew nearer and nearer.

“It is finished.”

“Indeed, it is.”

“With this, the cyborgs shall be no more, eradicated from the face of the universe. Or at least, their presence shall be all but negligible.” Finished with soaking in the view, Jebediah turned away from the window and looked at his two comrades. Samuel withdrew the activation pad from his briefcase, held it out. Jebediah cleared his throat, tightened his tie, then grabbed their shoulders. “My fellows. We were driven out, and there is no one to blame but ourselves. Back then, we knew the risks. We knew the dangers. But still, they drove us out. And for that, they must pay. Here we stand on this marvelous day, and you know what they say: Noth-”

“No time for your paragraph-long quotation: Bombs Away!” Isaiah snatched the detonator from Samuel’s hands, then repetitively mashed his finger into the big red button, jitter-clicking the city into oblivion.

“You idiot. We ain’t placed the bombs yet.”

“…”

“Could’ve been bad if we had activated the activator already.”

“Weren’t you listening to the plan at all?”

“Y~~e~s.”

“Alright, whatever, we don’t have time fer this. Here, take these,” Jebediah shoved a map into Isaiah’s hands, along with a duffel bag full of explosives. “Place your bombs, then go distract those cyborg troops or whatnot so we can go get the transport vessel. Once we activate, make sure your timings not off, they’re rigged to explode on cycle.”