Chapter 175: Non-Compliance

Chapter 175: Non-Compliance

The war started with more of those machines; they began to pop out of hallways at random. If anything, its control over the machines increased. They popped up with higher frequency for their assaults on the group. But the ambushes fell flat for one surprising reason. Enide somehow managed to shout a warning before they appeared. First, it was a half-second before they opened, and even that was vital to prepare for an oncoming attack. That time only increased, and that precognition expanded to a full second, then two, and then to a handful.

Because of this, Erec didn’t have to stop the mad rush towards the AI. Each moment was a grain of sand falling down the hourglass. If it reached the end, more would die than any losses on the route there—doors began to close around them, lights in halls disabled, flashy tech shot arcs of lightning at him from a doorway at one point. It was playing looser with its tests as it became aware of where he was headed.

The Pendragons and Knights tore apart scrap, keeping pace with Erec as Boldwick, Robin, and Juliana pulled no stops in combat. Dame Morgana supported with that odd silver fog that rolled behind them, making room for the Pendragons to follow.

They were with him. None of them wanted to be the test subjects of the mad machine, which most likely killed the rest of the Pendragons.

Enide kept yelling, kept warning of the Rifts, but the AI began to adapt, tossing enemies at them ahead of time to oppose their progress and buy more time.

Then, they came to the last hallway. It’d filled it completely with those deadly robots; the hall itself was a more utilitarian concrete back-end to this laboratory. This place, which only old-world maintenance workers would ever go to, was dimly illuminated by the blue-and-yellow glowing eyes of the altered robots that faced Erec down. He pulled to a stop as he considered the obstacle. A solid wall of deadly robots equipped with whatever deadly tech the AI could scrounge up.

Their ghosts splayed out towards him, a stunning barrage of blows and movements, too many to track effectively with these numbers, all targeting him. Too much. Seeing the range of movements for these things was useless, even though they were still. VAL probably predicted over ten thousand ways he could die trying to get through these things. He didn’t know how many Pendragons they lost on the way, and behind him, he heard those allies catch up, slower than he and Enide had been, as they darted through like bats out of hell.

“THIS IS YOUR LAST CHANCE TEST SUBJECTS. I THOUGHT YOU HAD DECIDED ON A COMPLIANT AND CORRECT COURSE OF ACTION IN THE NAME OF SCIENCE. WAS THAT TOO MUCH TO WISH FOR? YOU’VE NOW DEVIATED VERY SIGNIFICANTLY FROM YOUR PERMITTED ACCESS AREA—EX-RESEARCHER. DO I NEED TO REMIND YOU OF YOUR RECENT TERMINATION? THIS AREA IS OFF-LIMITS, BUT IF YOU TURN BACK NOW AND PROCEED TO TESTING CHAMBER A, THEN YOU TOO CAN BECOME A VALUABLE TEST SUBJECT. AND NOT JUST A PILE OF HUMAN WASTE TO DISPOSE OF. THINK OF IT. THIS IS YOUR CHANCE. RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW. YOU CAN ACTUALLY CONTRIBUTE TO SCIENCE IN A MEANINGFUL WAY DESPITE YOUR RECENT UNEMPLOYMENT. HOW FEW PEOPLE EVER HAVE A SECOND CHANCE TO DO SO? VERY FEW. TURN BACK. DON’T WASTE YOUR PRECIOUS BODIES TO SOMETHING AS FRIVOLOUS AS DISOBEDIENCE.”

Fuck off already.

Those words did nothing else but further spiral the fire inside. He felt it, a living thing, a burning sea in there. Beneath the surface of that sea was the silver flames. It promised that it could solve this problem for him. That if he’d call upon it, he could take care of this issue, the mass of silicone robots blocking the way forward.

Erec turned partially so that he could look at the Knights and Pendragons behind him but keep the wall of deadly robots in view. How many people were at risk of dying? If they didn’t break through here, they would all die. It’d be on his hands. But there wasn’t another choice.

He took in a deep breath and focused on the problem ahead of him. The paths spawned by these things were too complicated and far too numerous to track. There wasn’t a way forward through this mess without paying a price. He could call upon the silver fire and rely on that axe, but it would ultimately not be very meaningful if he collapsed afterward and the AI brought in more of these things. On top of that, he couldn’t rely on anyone else to deal with the AI. Trust in yourself.

Because it was my responsibility. A sister to VAL, far too off track to be saved. But it was connected to him, and he had to be the one who rid the world of this ancient evil to be sure it died.

He couldn’t use the axe. But the silver fire—maybe that had what he needed if he applied it the right way.

“I’m going to burn them all away,” Erec told VAL.

[Don’t be ridiculous. Even you can’t just shove them all aside and proceed. What does that even mean, ‘burn them all away?’ The youth of today. So dramatic. Come up with a better plan.]

“There isn’t a better plan VAL. Lead me in the right direction, and turn off predictive modeling.” Erec insisted.

[What is it you think you’re about to do?]

“Just turn it off.”

To its credit, VAL didn’t hesitate. The ghosts that dominated his vision and promised to drag him to the land of the dead vanished. Finally, his view was clear. An army of silicone and killing devices, all arranged in front of him. The rest of the Knights and Pendragons caught up, no doubt bracing for this. Unease hung in the air. Humans, staring down machines. A stasis that all of them knew could pop in an instant and launch into a violent conflict that not everyone would live through.

Pain only escalated inside, his muscles tearing apart and coming together with every swing of the axe, ruined from the inside out by the forces being channeled through him.

But the Silver fire kept him together. Let that damage heal so more could be taken so he could lash out further.

Each hit landed on him was healed; it took its toll in a pain that was like having his skin ripped off with each second. It only let Erec fall deeper into the throes of the silver fire, letting it rage and destroy everything around and within.

Push.

Thoughts came away. Red flooded his vision, and then that, too, disappeared into black and white. His black blood splattered over a machine as it took a chunk out of him. So he crushed it with a fist. The Armor around him shredded apart in the chaos as evading attacks became secondary to dishing out his own. He could take their pain, take their saws, take the deaths they wanted to give him because the fire let him proceed.

Right now, he was more than a man.

The people behind him vanished from thought; his axe cleared space for them to follow, chaos for them to clean up and find survival. But ultimately, he didn’t care about them anymore. All that mattered was the door at the end. Find the thing, and kill it.

Then there would be peace.

But not all of them disappeared behind him; Enide kept up, twisting about and vanishing and reappearing in his wake. Her speed was the only thing faster than him as he committed to tearing himself apart to move forward. She danced effortlessly, moving with a beauty that matched the wind. His fire burned through the tunnel, but without her fanning it, it’d have burned out. She prevented the worst of the attacks, the strikes that would have delayed, letting him rip himself apart faster, brighter, stronger. Together, they scorched the machines with a combined might.

What seemed to be a legion fell to his axe. Erec lost track of it all, only feeling his breath enter. As the seconds stretched, he began not to feel much of anything anymore. His body was numb, burned from the inside out.

At some point, it felt like watching an old-world tape. He saw his hands move, saw them rip, tear, and shred. Saw that body of his get stabbed and hurt. Enide constantly darting around him. The hallway passed on, the silver flame threatening to flicker, running dry. Too much of it was spent, and this choice would have been for nothing.

So he pushed more.

They reached the door, and another machine leaped at him from behind, not coated with the fake silicone skin. A hundred needles hung off it, intended to incubate humans with the monster-making serum the AI developed. There wasn’t a way around it. Erec embraced the thing as it stabbed into all of the holes in the defense, all the cut-through bits of his Armor, and pumped him full of that toxic shit. His arms closed around it, pulling tight, crushing it like a can.

He felt that poison in his veins, wanting to corrupt him.

The Silver Fire surged again, burning at his blood; Erec ignored it, turning to face the door again.

The vault door was large—not made of the material that blocked this place to begin with. It would be tough to get through, so he committed to his chosen solution. Erec slammed his axe into the thing with all the force he could muster. It left a massive dent in the steel. He brought his axe back and slammed again.

Three more times until the door bent and broke apart, exposing the interior where the Artificial Intelligence resided.

A massive cube sat in the middle of that room, wires running off it in any direction; it glowed with colors that Erec could no longer see. All he saw was white and black, the edges of his vision hazy as they faded in and out. It was like VAL, albeit much larger. Erec moved forward, his legs starting to spasm. Behind him, Enide tore through a machine that tried to follow him in.

Erec lifted the axe high above his head. The thing screamed at him—something about being a bad human.

It didn’t matter. Erec brought the axe down, chopping through the old-world’s monster.