The Metal and the Mental (TGIF two a days!)

'I-cannot-believe-master-asked-us-to-fight-this-one.....'

Dropping the motionless body of Jon's onto the ground, a robot painted in green looked over him with a slouched posture. It squatted down, letting the pieces of armor over its knees and hips slide to the side in this body position as it reaches out and poked Jon in the side of his face, to which the human grunted angrily.

'...Worse-yet, you-took-him-down-too-quickly! Now-all-I-have-left-is-the-torture!' The green robot complained before pointing an accusing finger towards its companions which stepped out from the shadow, 'Red! Are-you-out-to-get-me! Want-me-to-slice-your-wires?! Want-to-get-recycled????!!!'

'Calm-down, Green.' A robot painted in blue with four arms said calmly as it went passed its green companion and picked up Jon with one of its four arms. Compared to Green, its armor is a lot thicker, and it is quite a bit taller compared to the bratty robot.

'YOU-TOO, BLUE!' Green was provoked even further by Blue's actions and it raised the pitch and speed of speech even further, 'IT-IS-A-CONSPIRACY, YOU-CONSPIRATORIAL-ROBOTS!'

Blue turned its head and glanced over at Green with a menacing glow in its eyes, and Green jumped up into the air before hugging itself around one of Blue's arms.

'Big-bro-BLUEEEEEEE!' It exclaimed before digging its little claws into the metallic shells of Blue's body, 'Can-you-help-me-kill-Red...just-this-once?'

'Shut-it.' Blue said, glancing back towards Red who has been silent all throughout this ordeal. It is strange that Green is the one causing a ruckus and Red being so quiet, seeing Red is the one who landed the finishing hit onto Jon after all.

As Jon's body wobbled with Blue's every step and his chin clashing against the hard shell at every single step, just how the heck did this happen?

By the time Jon cleared the level with the hive mind, he had already gone down five levels. To his surprise, the robots in all the levels down until level twenty five have been few and far between, as all there is are the server rooms. He is sure that there might be some traps laid out in the various parts, but if he stuck to the stair case for the most part, everything should be sunshine and rainbows.

Then, he was ambushed by a release of toxic gases before countless pairs of cables were shot out from the various corners of the darkness. He immediately moved out of the way with his footwork as quick as shooting stars, though a shadow with a green tint dashed in front of him and followed him stride for stride. As the backgrounds of the office corridors flew by rapidly, all that Jon saw in front of him are a pair of eerily glowing green eyes.

Turning his body in mid air, he sent forth a strike down the mid-line of the robot when suddenly a second shadow appeared. This time, it came with a red tint and a pair raging red eyes. Its fist clashed with Jon's very own, and it didn't even budge for an single inch.

Jon's eyes widened as he put more and more power into his strike. And yet the robot for some reason is able to perfectly match every ounce of force that Jon is outputting as if he is pushing into the surface of a planet himself. It is only himself that will be pushed away as a result.

The green glow disappeared as it dashed around the corner and tried to attack Jon from behind, though he was able to spot out the attack and easily parried it with his spare hand. The green robot's attacks are a lot weaker compared to that of the red one's but it had enough speed that there would have been further damage to Jon's clothes regardless.

Then, a pair of robotic claws silently approached Jon, grasping onto his ankles and locking him in place. The claw tore through his socks and snapped off Jon's skin on the first impact, but instead a patch was stuck onto him instead.

Shit! Jon cursed underneath his breath and kicked his feet up, ripping out the pair of robotic limbs that were attached to his ankles before letting go of the fist that he was clashing with the red robot. The sudden release of pressure sent the red robot forward and Jon pivoted around the chunky body, guiding the red robot to clash into the green robot from right behind him.

There was a sound of a loud crash as if two vehicles had collided at high speed, and Jon continued running forward when suddenly his legs cramped up, breathing became difficult and his vision started to blur.

There were the sounds of two robot arguing with one another before a heavy footstep approached Jon as he fell onto the ground.

Then, he heard the sound of a mechanism cocking up and coiling back before he was hit in the back of his head. His chin denting the floor on impact and his consciousness went ahead and took a vacation.

I cannot believe I never trained my poison durability back then....Jon thought, god damn non-invasive medicine patches.

Thankfully, Jon's heightened metabolism brought him right back not too long after, though, by that time, Red, Blue and Green had already pinned him in place in a similar mechanism that made up Red's heavy robotic body.

There were wires and cables looping around Jon's arm and are slowly cutting off blood supply to his limbs while more patches of sedative and poison are stuck onto various parts of his body. His hoodie had already been completely ripped up by this point, and a bright flash light is pointed directly at him in the face.

'Big-bro-BLUE! Can-I-press-the-button?' Green asked excitedly, and Jon glanced over towards the origin of that voice when he saw a figure squatting down on the ground holding something. He activated eyes as sharp as a string of atoms when a sharp pain exploded in his head, causing him to grunt loudly and cut off the activation.

'HA! This-madman-gone-ahead-and-did-it! HAHAHAHAHAH!' Green's laughter meant Jon did exactly what he wanted. Then, before he had anytime to process what the hell just happened, the towering figure of Blue emerged from behind the flash light, a pair of ghostly blue glowing eyes floating in mid air.

'Here's-the-deal.' Blue said, 'Master-wanted-to-extract-some-truth-out-of-you, so-if-we-are-sensing-abnormal-levels-of-anything, we-are-zapping-you. Don't-lie, don't-power-up, and don't-hold-anything-in~'

'Let's-get-it-going-already.' Red spoke at last, and Blue nodded its head slightly before backing away from the flashlight once more.

'Are-you-responsible-for-Hannah-Betrick's-death?' Blue asked coldly, and Jon looked up at him when the thundering headache returned.

'ARE-YOU-RESPONSIBLE-FOR-HANNAH-BETRICK'S-DEATH!' Blue asked once again with a raised voice.

'....' Jon sagged his head down, and the image of Hannah lying in his arms returned, '...I am.'

'How-did-she-die?'

'She was attacked.' Jon said.

'BY-WHO?!'

'By my father and the ones he controlled.'

'Why-did-you-not-save-her?' Blue asked, 'WHY-DID-YOU-LET-HER-DIE!'

Jon looked up at the distant glow of the three pairs of eyes as the three robots looked back at him.

That was not the robot's saying, not at all.

Patty was speaking to him through them.

'YOU-POSSESS-SUCH-STRENGTH, AND-YET-YOU-LET-HER-DIE? YOU-EXPECT-ME-TO-BELIEVE-YOUR-LIES?' Blue continued to step forward, the sound of his footsteps matching words of emphasis perfectly, 'In-the-underworld, nothing-is-more-important-than-bloodlines-and-family, and-your-family-ran-the-RED-COMPOUND-business, did-they-not?'

'They...did. But that does not mean...'

'And-you-hid-your-true-strength-for-all-that-time, and-you-only-used-it-after-she-was-dead!'

How could he have known?

That was what Jon wanted to shout out, but it is all but a pitiful excuse for his failure on many fronts.

'How did you explain what I did after then?'

'Do-your-actions-following-your-conspiracy-matter? Are-they-not-a-means-of-self-preservation?'

'I exposed what the RED COMPOUND was about!'

'You-created-a-fake-persona, ruined-an-entire-field-and-tried-to-create-your-own-narrative! Then-you-ran-away!'

'YOU-RAN-AWAY!'

Jon's eyes widened, and he no longer sought to struggle or deny what has happened. Instead, he remain drowned in silence.

'Nowadays-still, the-distribution-of-the-RED-COMPOUND-ran-rampant, and-you-expected-me-to-believe-your-words? You-expected-me-to-believe-that-this-was-not-a-scheme-by-your-family?'

'That's ridiculous. I destroyed everything down there!'

'Then-why-are-things-worse-now-than-they-have-ever-been?!'

'WHY?! Is-it-thanks-to-you, the-WORLD'S-STRONGEST-CAMERAMAN? You-thought-you-can-ruin-everything-and-start-anew-somewhere-else?'

A zap came from Green, and that was purely because it wanted to do it. It turned to look at blue and lets out a chuckle.

'Escape-your-hell-if-you-are-strong-enough-to-do-so, and-I-will-kill-you-myself!' Patty screamed, 'I-have-gotten-my-answer. Blue, Green, Red, dispose of him.'

'Yes, Master.' Blue's voice returned to normal, and it started approaching the mechanism held in place.

Jon stayed still for a moment as he processed what he just heard through the influence of the drugs. There was anger in Patty's tone, but that's not it.

There was something else there.

Jon cannot be trapped in this cage for any longer. For now, there is no one else he wanted to see more than her.

The effects of the drug has already worn off mostly, though the initial hit did get to him for a long while.

It appeared that Patty really wanted to see the power that he used in the underworld, so that's what he will give her.

He hadn't used this level of his power for a long time, and he never thought he would have to use it today.

Taking a deep breath in, he murmured a line that was barely registered by the auditory system of Blue.

'Escalation 2....COSMIC EMPOWERMENT....activate.'

Blasts of air shot out of the cage as the cables that once wrapped tightly around Jon's limbs started coming off. The patches were sent flying away from his skin as the shear amount of air pressure generated from Jon's power up completely dismantled the mechanisms that was held him squarely in place. Blue shielded it's cameras with two of its arms as he clamped himself down onto the ground. Then, it saw Jon's figure levitating through the cage before landing gently on the ground.

'ATTACK!' Sensing a level of threat higher than they had ever registered even during the most difficult of simulated training sessions, the three robots attacked one after another. Green was the fastest and the first one in, and Jon raised a hand and flicked his finger at him. A jet of highly pressurized air was immediately accelerated so far that it turned into a bullet made of plasma and cleanly burned through Green's circuit board.

The robot lets out a whine before it fell onto the ground.

Red was the second one to approach, and it charged headfast towards Jon when they clashed fist once more and Jon pressed down on its entire arm as if he was crushing an empty can under his boot. The impact popped Red's arm out of its socket and spun its body around by ninety degrees despite the resisted mechanisms built into its torso. Every single fiber, linkages, nuts and bolts are snapped at once, and Red dropped onto the ground as two individual pieces.

Blue lacked the speed of Green and strength of Red, though he can make up for it with the shear variety and flexibility in its attacks. However, as it braced itself for the incoming doom, Jon simply walked passed it.

'Go help those two and give me and Patty some time alone.' Jon said as his stomped through the floor and created a hole under him.

Then, he stepped through it and continued his descent.