NickelQuest #2: Reanimation

<NickelQuest: #2 Transaction – Reanimation>



“Nicky! Wake up, already!”

The distant cries of seagulls call to you. The ocean waves, gently rising and falling. And a voice. A girl, perhaps? It’s unclear at best. You open your eyes against the glaring rays of the sun. You see the white-crested waves shimmering in the glorious blue. The course sand beneath you. And the girl…she runs towards you, her back to the sun. You can’t make out her face…

But then it’s gone.

The sunlight fades. And when you truly open your eyes, the sight is less than reminiscent of the dream.

The cold, sickening green light seems to be cast from barely-functional LEDs. Their Dust chargers must be near the brink. And all it seems to illuminate…is rust.

A scrapheap. As far as the eye can see, there is nothing but scrap metal and wasted salvage. The course sand you felt earlier was nothing more than metal, so rusted it had crumbled to an oxide dust.
Above is nothing but black. From what you can tell, the scrapheap is in some kind of vast cavern, or similar…the nearby sounds of dripping water at least suggest some kind of interior runoff.

As you slowly take in the decaying environment, you come to a dreadful realisation.

This is your tomb.

Broken machines. What remains of robots, strewn about in pieces. Their dulled eyes, eternally starring into nothingness. You wonder what those cold lenses last saw…

And of course, there’s you, with the rubble beneath you.

You’re uncertain if you dare look down to inspect yourself.

<Ah…did you rest well? How were the electric sheep?>

The voice seems to somehow call from every direction at once, reverberating throughout the chamber. Now that you seem to have more or less fully regained your senses, you feel even more repulsed at the idea of facing the entity it belongs to. You feel restored…at least to an extent. You might even be able to move well enough to get out of this dreadful place…assuming you can find an exit.

The supposed ‘superior officer’ that may or may not have tended to your body is nowhere to be seen. What do you do?

[ ] Reply (write-in)
[X] Assess your current physical state
[ ] Attempt to flee
[X] Stand to attention (Law)
[ ] Find the bastard and show him where he can stick his damn orders (Chaos)

Talking and observing are free actions, i.e., you can Reply + assess + physical action, although a combination of the three may not be necessarily advisable (calling out whilst trying to escape stealthily probably wouldn’t help your case very much, for example).


Perhaps it would be best to hear him out…your mind is clouded and he’s the only one who seems to have even acknowledged your existence in this mechanical graveyard. But first, you’d better get to grips with the state of your body. You look down to see…

[ ] Describe your physique:

Build:
[X] Average
[ ] Muscular
[ ] Emaciated
[ ] Other

Height:
[ ] Average
[ ] Tall (HMC penalty cost: in excess of feasible human height, i.e. 7-8 foot+)
[X] Short (Same as above: below feasible human height (for adult))

Mechanical definition:
[ ] Cannot be seen (though it could be where you can’t currently see…)
[ ] Torso
[X] Upper limbs
[X] Lower limbs (HMC PP: Easily exposed with short-cut clothing)
[ ] extremities, including face (HMC PP (double): Exposed unless extremities are covered)

For HMC of 2 (current stat), you are required to take at least two HMC PP (more can be taken if desired)


[5'5", average build, ball joints throughout limbs.]


You appear to be predominantly naked…which is an odd thing for you to observe, you reflect. Why shouldn’t a machine be naked? As you anticipated, your body seems to be built to at least closely resemble a female human…with notable changes. You vaguely recall your original body being closer to the real thing…your arms and legs now have crudely wrought ball-joints, which worryingly extend to your hands or feet. You also seem to be considerably shorter than you remember.

But it pays to be thankful for small mercies – at least you’re in one piece, which is more than can be said to your immediate peers.
You brace yourself, summoning your strength as best you can to right yourself…
You push firmly down on the pile beneath you to push your upper body up…and your arms go straight through the pile, all the way down to the shoulder.

Whoops.

You try to shift your legs to free yourself…but it’s no good. You’re not as flexible as your remember being, and the angle simply won’t let you pull your arms out. You’re well and truly stuck.

<Oh my. Whatever are you doing?>

Can it see you? Did it see you making a fool of yourself? Do you…care? How strange…

[X] Reply (write-in)
[ ] Ignore him and continue trying to free yourself
[ ] Lie prone and pretend to have shut down
[ ] Other (write-in)


You briefly consider turning over...but throwing your weight against your limbs could end pretty poorly. As you twist slightly, you think you hear creaking. Probably a bad move...

Maybe dignity is a little overrated after all…

“Uh…a little help over here? Got my joints stuck in this pile of corpses."

<Robot corpses?>

"Which I’m not one of!" you snap, irritably.

<Hmm…whoever said they were dead?>

You definitely hear a creaking now. You’re not sure that it’s from your arms.
Can robots sense fear? Right now the question doesn’t feel so philosophical.

<I shouldn’t worry, they’re barely salient. I can’t imagine they envy your working parts too much. Even if they did, I don’t think they’d be able to take them from you. Probably.>

The creaking grows louder. You need to get away from the pile now…

You scour your body for your available functions. Most of them seem sealed off…clearly someone didn’t want you to get away so easily. There’s one though…Help.exe? Sounds too good to be true…

<Sorry, did you say you needed help? I don’t recall you saying, ‘Sir, please rescue me! I’m too pathetic to save myself from broken robots!’>

What a-dick. What to do?

[ ] Beg for help
[X] Activate Help.exe
[ ] Wrench yourself as hard as you can…
[X] Other (specify)


You’ll be damned before you take any more humiliation from that pompous prick. If robots can be damned, anyway.

"Just watch and learn you Fucko! I already got an ace up my sleeve!"

“Systems Initiate! Protocol Execute: “Help”!”

And with that, Help.exe activates!

“Help!”

Er…

“I need somebody! Help! Not just anybody! Help!”

The executable seems to have just opened a media player. It’s playing some ancient-sounding music, from the old kingdoms…

It’s not very helpful.

<Ah, you found my favourite function! Excellent! Honestly, I thought you were a mindless troglodyte, but it’s refreshing to know you have such refined tastes in the arts.>

This is the worst. Maybe if you just play dead, the robots will let you go…

Or maybe they’ll just strip you limb from limb.

<On the other hand, did you try running it with Administrator privilidges? Oh, I didn’t give you those, did I? What a pity. Would you like them? How MUCH would you like them, per say?>

Between humiliation and being cannibalised, you’re not sure which is the worse option. Or maybe there’s another…

[ ] Try to bypass the Admin restrictions…
[X] Wrench yourself free
[ ] Reason with A-DIC? He can’t have repaired you for nothing…
[X] Other


You attempt to minimize your grin. Unfortunately, you can only reduce it to a faint smirk. Despite apparently being in danger moments earlier, the situation strikes you as rather humerous.

Enough is enough. You’d rather risk breaking your own body than letting someone else do it for you.

Although you also feel like being a little spiteful.

With the media player open, you seem to be able to access a series of other audio files…at least one of which doesn’t mesh with the current one. You play it, in tandem with Help.exe

The two songs really don’t go well together.

<Oh, how simply dreadful! What barbaric bootleg is this? Have you no decency?> wails A-DIC, despondently.

You quietly smirk to yourself, quite satisfied. But now it’s time to move.

You swing the full weight of your torso against your arms. One way or another, with or without your arms, you’re getting off this damn pile.

The mound shudders. Then collapses in on itself.

The mass of twisted metal caves in from the top, sending out a wave of shattered machinery across the scrapheap.

Fortunately for you, you weren’t on it when it happened.

Because the momentum you gained from throwing your weight rolled you not only clear of the pile, but threw you down to the foot of the mound, leaving you in a remarkably-sized crater of your own creation.

But you’re undamaged. Amazing.

<Stupendous! I’ve still got it! Frankly, I thought the Iron Maiden model was a fundamentally flawed design, but your sheer tenacity is simply remarkable!>

You test your functionality…you should finally be able to stand.

[X] Stand to attention as originally planned
[ ] Make a break for it
[ ] Wait for A-DIC to make his move
[ ] Ignore A-DIC and inspect the environment
[ ] Call out to A-DIC (write-in, can be used with others)


Well, you had your fun. Might as well try and get on A-DIC’s good side, if it’s even possible at this point.

You carefully lift yourself up, straighten up, put your heels together and salute.

“Sir! Unit P-3771 reporting for duty, sir!”, you announce.

You stare firmly ahead…and as you do, the air seems to swirl, and gain form.

The green LEDs swivel and focus their beams all on the space in front of you.

And a gigantic green face appears. Humanoid, apparently, but not particularly convincing, especially considering that it appears to be a projection over 20 feet high.

A-DIC glares down at you. He doesn’t seem hugely impressed, despite being so vocally overjoyed moments earlier.

<…Turn that nonsense off and wipe that look off your face, soldier. That’s an order.>

Huh? Oh. Shit.

Whilst trying to look prim and proper, you seem to have absent-mindedly forgotten to turn off the music you started playing earlier. And without realising it, the smug grin you made in satisfaction apparently hasn’t subsided. Whoops.

But how can a machine be absent-minded? Maybe something went wrong with your restoration...but that's not something to worry about right now. A-DIC is still glaring at you.

[X] Obey A-DIC’s orders
[ ] Ignore A-DIC’s orders and try to change the subject (suggest topic)
[ ] Defiantly refuse the orders
[X] Other

“Sir, I find your projected refresh rate to be simply stunning, sir! It must be perfectly synchronized, sir!”

So saying, you shut off the track you had playing, and switch to another on your internal speakers. What curious music the ancient humans crafted…you fight the urge to bob your head in rhythm, lest you give yourself away.

<…Flattery will get you nowhere, 3771. In the old days that kind of comment could get you court martialled for graphical harassment. How I miss those times… But now is not the time for such wistfulness. We are short on time. The orders I gave you before your reconstruction must be executed effective immediately. I trust you remember them.>

He stares at you judgmentally. You try to look professional.

He doesn’t look hugely convinced.

<…If you’ve anything to ask, hurry up and speak now. There is little time, and you need to have your equipment and vehicle prepared.>

What to do?

[X] Ask about your orders
[ ] Ask about something else (‘What in the world is going on?’ would be acceptable.)
[ ] You’re fine, get to preparations and the mission
[X] Other

You try to fight the urge to be cheeky. You utterly fail.

"Graphical harassment? But sir, you've been inside my deepest circuitry~" so saying, you activate your blushing subroutine. It seems you managed to get more of functions back online…

<…It seems I was rightly concerned about your incompatible CPU. You self-determination protocols are entirely outside the acceptable margins of error for Atlesian military specification. However, given the current circumstances, there is nothing more to be done.>

You smile meekly at him. He merely frowns in response.

“Sir! It seems my incompatible CPU needs reminding of my orders, sir!” you pipe up, finally able to at least slightly reign in your cheekiness.

<…Very well. As stated, you are to locate and retrieve the AWOL scouting unit I sent on reconnaissance some fifteen days ago. The state you return it in is of no concern, so long as its memory banks remain intact. Once the data is retrieved and analysed, you will use it to continue its mission, and investigate the outside world until making contact with intelligent life. Is that clear, Unit?>

[X] Sir, yes, sir!
[X] Query further (state topic)
[ ] Other

“Sir, yes sir!” You bark, whilst subtly changing track to a thematically appropriate song. You quietly gaze in amazement at your internal display, showing off your databanks. It seems you have about 567 Yottabytes of memory, over 90% of which is taken up by ancient obsolete audio files. You’re not even sure how they got there. You doubt even A-DIC knows.

Although, a thought does occur to you…

“…Sir! What if the scouting unit is hostile? Am I allowed to engage if it is? What do i retrieve if it breaks during combat?”

<…You may use whatever means you deem necessary. If the unit refuses to cooperate…or if it has been…corrupted…you may use destructive force. If the memory banks are damaged…well, you simply won’t have any intel for when you resume its expedition.>

<Now, are you ready for your preparations?>

[X] Lets get kitted out
[ ] “Corrupted?”
[ ] Other query
[ ] Other action

You feel like there's a great deal of information missing from the picture...but you put it from your mind. You're a soldier. You should obey your orders. You'll be a dick about them, but not question them. For now, at least.

"Let's get kitted out! I need to be combat ready!" you declare, doing a slightly silly pose.

A-DIC doesn't even bat an eyelid. Dammit.

<…Very well. Step this way, I’ll lead you to what remains of the armory.>

So saying, A-DIC’s massive visage dissipates, and the sickening green LEDs shift and form a dotted line leading into the darkness of the scrapheap. In the distance, you can hear the shifting of heavy gears and what could very well be locking bolts of a gigantic pneumatic door.

You walk intrepidly along the illuminated path and into the shadows beyond. As you do, you briefly see a flicker of a signal appear on your display…IR? UV? It was too brief to see, maybe a fraction of picosecond. Maybe it was your imagination. You put it from your mind, and continue on towards to doorway.

What you don’t hear is the broken whisper that accompanied the signal from the depths of the scrapheap.

[Atlas…they’ve taken the city…the Abominations have us now. Warn the Council…WE WILL HAVE THEIR HIDES]



<#2 Transaction Concluded: Reanimation>