Part 1: Captured alive.

The blob’s tentacle had pushed me inside its 'mouth' as countless strands from within restrained my body. A bubble formed with the interior containing myself and part of the liquid outside of the blob. Then the walls of the said bubble were reinforced by three-legged structures forming a Jail with triskelion motifs. This happened at the same time my body was anchored in its center and until the last ray of external light disappeared.

My vision went dark and a feeling of pressure enveloped my body. I knew that the current situation was dire and I needed to escape the blob's stomach as fast as possible. It was just that my body didn’t react and my only perception was touch! Apart from that... everything was nothingness. Did something happen to the system?

A18, what is happening?

Is everything fine?

A18, answer me!

…

Time was drifting, I didn't know what to do until a point in time where a broken screen appeared in my mind.

A forced restart?

So I shouted, hoping to receive a response from the buggy and pixelated interface that appeared in my ‘conscience’.

A18?!

The interface started to reassemble like a digital puzzle formed of incomprehensible mosaics. My hopeless mind regained a little spark as purple text and a voice I missed for a small lapse of time reappeared.

M% asd4 da&Pa$da

A18, is everything fine?

Any damage?

M-My… P-pU5d13… R3pa1r5hs

A18, come on! Get back on the right track, we need to get out of here!

The interface and the voice restructured and eventually became comprehensible.

Repairing…

Good, normal speech!

How are we faring A18?

My puddle…. We have lost around 50MMs, some of which were extremely important to the user’s interface. The external system has lost 7% of processing units. Vision has 3% of damaged pixels… The movement system suffered 14% damage over control units, it remains usable but might fail to work if overused. The user interface has been forcefully interrupted in an attempt to repair the priority systems…

Oof! Skip those bits for now...

More importantly, thank god you are still here… I thought I was going to be alone and that I wouldn’t be able to hear a voice, even if artificial, once again.

Repairing... Repairing... Repairing...

How much do we have to wait for repairs?

Estimated time: unknown.

…If only we could move...

User interface repaired…

Loading drivers...

User drivers and controls loaded…

Priority self-repair done...

Suspending Secure mode...

Turning on background mode…

Reconnecting damaged sectors to User's interface...

Restarting previous crashed programs...

My puddle, the sensors and the flagellum stopped working but they should be usable now.

Finally?

My reaction when reconnecting to the world was similar to re-entering an almost ended game. One in which you still had the possibility to turn the tables, but time was rapidly sliding off from your hands.

My missing senses restarted one by one, something that re-ignited that hopeful desire to live. I tried to move with the idea, yet my body didn't react how I wished. I gazed at what appeared to be trident-like restraints and ropes that constrained me into the center of a spherical chamber. The light orb's glitter holding like a quivering candle in the storm.

My puddle the light from the orb might disappear at any moment.

I checked the window and the orb had 10% of 'luminescence' activity remaining.

The whole room was quiet and dark if not for it. I knew loading it inside a blob might not be a good idea. Recharging it could work if the potato potion somehow triggered confusion to the blob. However, it may also trigger an opposite reaction and make the blob explode with me, these monsters were too sensitive towards it. So I threw the idea to the side, at least until there was no better option to choose.

My vision adjusted and thanks to the still lasting light, I could grasp my current surroundings while reaching an expected conclusion. An ovoid room with greyish jelly-like walls and sturdy metal-like black columns that sealed me from the outside. There was a little tinge of transparency from the walls, meaning that light could enter this space. I'm I captured alive for some reason... no... this room, it seemed somehow familiar, could it be...

However, before being able to give a shout at my assumptions, a place in the walls started to deform. A weird spiral structure appeared in a sector of the walls and stretched the visible surface like a whirlpool. The opening rotated allowing a black shadow-like fluid to pour inside the chamber. The difference in density was seen thanks to the fluttering flicker of my almost inactive light-orb when focusing on my front direction.

I may not know what that black substance that drifted from the wall was with exactitude, yet I knew what it would do to me if I remained here for a long time. What expanded from the wall might be acid, nanomachines, enzymes--it could even be ‘something’ worse! Nonetheless, it was obvious that I shouldn’t let myself be bathed or enveloped in it.

Anxiousness tried to cloud my thought process, the things detaining me in place weren’t allowing my body to move. Staring at the murky mist that hovered like a ghost while it mixed in the lightened water, provided me with resolution. Well, more like that desire to kick someone’s ass even if it meant my death.

The musings of a cornered rat, if it couldn’t live to tell the tale, it will take the tale down with it. Yes, I was angry and wanted to slap this blob until nothing would recognize its leftovers. A feeling that went a little bit outside my usual nature, but my body had a bomb that could be used for a ‘last-moment’ occasion.

Part 2: Drastic Countermeasures.

Heh, bastard, you actually want to eat me? Then let me return the favor!

The bomb was reflected in my sensor. It was hanging beside the 1st sphere and attached to the long tail called flagellum. The 2nd sphere which contained tiny devastating destroyers was part of my stomach, but also part of my ‘emergency-only’ repertoire. I wouldn’t lie by telling my first thoughts at such moments were to release all of them and probably end myself and the blob. But then thinking that this room might resist the digestive NMs, my thoughts calmed.

The process of the mist mixing with the room was slow in my eye. It was probable that my ‘thoughts’ were accelerated after a forced restart. It could also be a consequence of fewer services running in the background. Whatever... all of this nonsense meant, that I finally got a solution.

A18, move the second sphere and release small portions of its contents over the restraints near the flagellum.

My puddle, the digestive NMs might damage the flagellum, are you sure you wish to continue?

Don’t ask me that at such moments! I-I mean... y-yes! HURRY UP!

Detaching the 2nd sphere...

Moving sphere to the selected restrains…

Not that one, A18! Start with the one to the left, to the left!

Readjusting…

Awaiting orders from the user to release NMs…

Okay, release them.

Carefully A18, very careful!

...

Small amounts of my digestive nanomachines were released at specific points on the restraints. It all happened while the corroding cloud neared, and at the same time that I awaited the AI’s accomplishment of the given order.

Faster A18, faster!

Closing the sphere, moving to the next restraint.

Yes, yes… only one more to go!

...

My puddle, the process has been completed!

Hearing a sexy and demonic voice for ‘salvation’ was odd, but I didn’t pay much attention to it at such instant...

Okay, I did. But in my mind, survival instinct predominated as I ignited my flagellum and started to slice the other constraints with it. Additionally, while I was concentrating on a thread cutting event, the 2nd sphere was reattached to its normal hanging spot by A18’s services.

The abrupt use of the digestive NMs was like vomiting, although no parts of the flagellum were damaged thanks to a precise release, the place where the sphere opened suffered partial damages.

My puddle the second sphere received a 10% damage to its door structure after the release. The reduced contents allowed for the sphere to remain stable.

Okay, Okay, I get it.

Anyways, by having the flagellum released from its bindings, the restraints that held my body were promptly slashed. Yet I made a self note to remind me that those little destroyers were really dangerous. They are so freaky that if their release wasn’t done with perfect precision, they might disconnect my one and only movement device and leave me disabled.

Just in time!

The digestive liquid had almost reached the middle of the chamber. Now that I could move, I hastily hovered and went towards the safe-zone on the other side of the room. Time was running out quickly and I needed to come up with a way to escape the jail before the damn digestive liquid reached me.

Lunging myself with impatience, I twirled my body while giving a strong slam to the wall with my flagellum. The tip slashed whilst giving a gelatinous cutting sensation. It lacerated the membrane creating a dent bigger than my body, but it wasn’t enough.

The wall’s width was bigger than I expected and while I watched, the whole thing repaired itself like magic. Time was slipping unremittingly and a second chance won’t appear if I didn’t do something. Releasing more Digestive NMs would deplete my fundamental way of self-repair, also known as digestion. My limited alternatives were running out as I slashed the wall.

My puddle, the cloud has passed the middle of the chamber!

At my back was the murky cloud that approached like an ominous black death, and at my front, the opaque triskelion-shaped jail and the gelatinous wall that self repaired. My vision played an important role in letting me know where the bars were separated, I only needed to pass through the gelating substance with enough momentum. Distance! I needed a boost! There was a way to get out!

But this wasn’t all that needed to be thought, the first problem was momentum. The second one required me to create a repetitive slashing motion. Since my flagellum slashed the walls easily, I decided to tear at it with a different approach, faster movements would open a quickly closing path and repetitive movements were needed to continuously maintain the path open before it self-repaired and closed. So I designed a plan… I believed it could work…

Now for the last requirement, I needed a calm mind and a concentrated disposition. The time to escape was limited, but I had more than enough to think.

A18, how plausible is the solution? Will the movement system tolerate it?

My puddle, there is a 23% chance that the movement system will be overstrained.

This is better than expected. If it didn’t work, there was nothing else but using the digestive NMs and hope for some luck self-repair kit. But let’s be honest that never happens.

A18! Start a simple three numbers countdown!

Yes, my puddle!

My body did a weird snake-like movement as I retreated myself from the wall. And then, having an adequate distance from the liquid at my back, my mind adjusted as my body took a position before what I marked as the starting point of an Olympic run. My vision sensor locked onto the previously slashed wall that nearly finished its regeneration.

Three!

One opportunity…

Two!

One opportunity…

One!

Don’t you dare miss it!

Goo! My puddle! You can do it!

My engine propelled me akin to a truck that wanted to send people to other worlds. A mad rush. I gained momentum quickly by rotating it counterclockwise, and eventually, the constant movement from the helix sent me forward.

My body advanced with increases in speed by using an excessive amount of energy reserves, but contrary to the typical approach many would think, when I was almost at collision point, my body did a 180 degrees turn. My vision pointing to the dark liquid and my tail towards the wall. It stopped its rotation for a short period, and then, starting to rotate in the opposite direction (clockwise). The change propelled me towards the virtually-marked area in the wall. All in preparation to pierce through it.

The so-called power of the spiral, drilling the crap out of that wall. That was the plan, in reverse of course. I so wanted to have a hand and point my middle finger at the cloud while smirking, I am free, bastard!

The backstabbing helix drilled through the wall and made a hole 1.5 times bigger than my body, allowing it to pass unhindered. It could be said that I went through the walls as easily as a drill perforating butter.

It wasn’t that easy though, there was something like surface tension. So at the last moment of my scape, I felt like I smacked something, and with a popping sensation, I saw how the walls closed and almost crushed me by a hair’s breadth.

Dejectedly, once I left the blob's digestive sphere my little light orb extinguished, but my vision remained relevant because the insides of this balloon-like creature glowed stronger than fireworks.