The Escort Mission

Felicia crawled through an opening on its underground rolling door, and found herself inside the bar's parking lot, which was now flooded by the rainwater, seeped through from the road outside. She couldn't get inside through the main door, because it was chained and locked. She thought about breaking the padlock, but she was worried that the sound of it would alert the soldiers, and if it didn't, they would be alerted by the damage on the padlock and the chain. Luckily she found the garage opening.

She then trudged through the water, always careful to not create too much sound, while shone her hand terminal's flashlight around to find a door to access the bar's interior proper. She found it, and it wasn't locked. Apparently, The Prophet's men didn't lock this place thoroughly. They probably thought that the chain on the main door and the constant patrols would be enough. She climbed the stairs and after opening another door at the end of the stairs, she managed to finally come inside the bar's proper interior.

Although she knew that all of it was just androids, the view of piles of humanoid bodies still made her horrified. There were hundreds of them, in various states of destruction, but she knew there were only 26 models, with each model shared the same facial and bodily forms. Model A through perhaps, E were created for sexual entertainment only, then the later models become more and more sophisticated, and were used for more complicated usages. Finally, models Y and Z were intricate enough that they were used in the science field, military field, and police work.

But no matter what the model was, they shared a hive mind. That was also probably the reason why they were so easily deactivated.

She looked around the interior. Once this was probably a really interesting place, with its classical interior but colored red with golden ornaments, created the otherworldly ambiance for its patron. The place where they would forget about the outside world for only a couple of hours. Now it was cold, dark, and damp. Lifeless. It shared no difference from the whole Angkara.

She started to unload the content of her backpack. The various hand terminals, batteries, cables, firearms she hoped she would never have a chance to use tumbled on top of the bar table. She studied some cables, then connects them to a memory box she also got from the bank security office. She opened another hand terminal, pushed some numbers, then copied the result to the memory box's touch display. It said connected. Okay, the first step succeeded.

She looked around, examining the piles of androids. She finally decided to use the one near her, model M. Its eyes looked blankly at her. She turned its head around to find an opening on the nape of its neck, where she saw the exact model number written on it: M-38. She forced it open and find two cable ports. She rummaged through her collection of cables and find the exact plugs. She plugged one end to her memory box and another to the android's ports. She waited for the memory box to be connected, and when it finally did with a soft beep, she touched the display 'connect' button. Now the display showed a loading bar, with a blinking 'loading'.

It beeped again, and she saw that it was connected. She looked at the android's eyes, it didn't look like it was connected. It was still staring blankly at her.

"Come on..." she whispered. She watched the display, and the face of the android she was trying to resurrect.

"Who are you?" the android finally said.

"Hey..." she was surprised. She did it, "umm hi... I'm Felicia Armstrong... I just need some..."

"Are you trying to reanimate us?"

"Oh... I'm afraid I'm unable to do that... Just one at a time, I guess... I don't know how they shut you all down, and so I don't know how to turn you all back on."

"Nobody shut us down," the android turned its head towards the ceiling, "we were automatically shut off when the APD exploded. At least I assume so. We were still functional for a couple of hours after its destruction, then everything went dark. I assume because the APD was finally burned down in its entirety."

"Well. You are right about that..." Felicia said, "...but that means, your main server was the APD, then?" The Prophet didn't shut them down, the APD destruction did that for them.

"Yes."

"So, there is no hope to reanimate all of you."

"Well, there is still hope. I can contact another android server in other cities."

"Or maybe straight to the central..." another idea brewed inside Felicia's mind, not just her way to get out of the city, but for the central government to finally do something about this. But first, she still needed some information, "look... M... 38, right?"

It hummed.

"Can you access the central server in the Capitol?"

"I can't do it alone. You're gonna need another forty-nine other androids resurrected to even have a chance."

"I can do that," she wasn't really sure, "see how easily I resurrected you..." she laughed nervously.

"Hmm.. good job," the thing smiled, "... but I feel a 'but' is coming."

"A bargain," she corrected it, "I will resurrect fifty of you in exchange of information."

"Hmm..." M-38 smiled, "I guess Y-14 was right after all. But what choice do I have... What do you want to know?"

"I wanna know what was the thing I helped in stealing from the art exhibition and its significance."

"Oh... it was the plates of Ogrario. We never know its significance, but apparently, it was magical," the android now turned its head to her, "how did you help somebody steal something without knowing what it was?"

She was stumped, "I... I don't know... I was under some influence..."

"BE?"

"No... not substance...I'm not sure what it was. It was like something took over my consciousness..."

"Right..." the android turned back to face the ceiling, "what else?"

"Who destroyed the APD?"

"One of us. Y-14."

Y-14? That was the one who contacted her about the corruption inside the department. What a strange coincidence. "Who ordered it?" she asked.

"Nobody," M-38 said, "it was Y-14's effort to destroy humanity, but as you can see, it was all in vain."

Destroy humanity, "is it here?"

The android hesitated, then, "I think so. But what HE knows, we know. So you might as well ask me. But I think he was destroyed along the APD building."

"Alright," the answer only raised new questions which she couldn't yet put into words. So she fell silent.

"You have to bring one of us to Adam," the android suddenly said.

"Adam?"

"Adam Williams. The former APD investigator. One of us needed to be one with him. We are important for him."

She remembered the man. He was the one escorting him to the Mayor's office. "I don't know how I can bring one of you outside of the city. Angkara was under heavy surveillance, not to mention the wall surrounding us."

"We have a battle mode. We can help you go outside, and reach Adam."

"A battle mode? Was that something Y-14 employed when it destroyed the APD and caused some chaos in the middle of the city?"

"Yes. I'm sure we could destroy the wall if you could somehow reactivate all of us."

"So.." said Felicia, "I resurrect fifty of you guys, so you can access the central server..."

"... and by accessing the central server, we could brute force the system to reactivate all of us. Only then we could help you go outside and deliver one of us to Adam."

She wondered what was so important with Adam. Maybe the only way to know is to follow M-38's instructions.

"I'm on it," she said.