{We need to get out of these vents as soon as possible!} I barked, giving Shelly control of one of my drones, leaving me with four and her with two.

Speeding up my thinking to the maximum I began hypothesizing which door would lead to whatever hallway our room was connected to. That one! The vent three spots to the left. Using a split-second to confirm with Shelly, we took off down the path of choice. The drone-ninja was on our tail, it couldn’t fly anymore, but boy, could it run.

Its eyes glowed red and it made a shrill shrieking sound that made me want to tear every microphone in this building to pieces. Shadows shifted as we passed. Things that I had mistaken as just dents and bulges in the vent plating now had two distinct red glowing dots peering from them. Even the damaged drones we spotted on the way here revealed their true nature. One jumped toward us. With a thought, Shelly grabbed it from the air telekinetically and shoved it into a group of other drone-ninjas that were moving to block our path.

“Arrgh, migraine!”

{Yeah, Ummm… I’m sure it sucks, but I think you're going to have to do it again.} I pointed out as several more of the pests pounced at us all at once.

The best I could do was dodge while Shelly did her best to keep them away from us. I weaved and turned and rolled in some pretty impressive maneuvers that I feel like I should be proud of. We both knew we couldn’t afford to lose any more drones. As I said, we didn’t have many and for me as an AI, as well as for Shelly as the semi-twisted experiment that she was, they were our only link to any outside world.

Avoiding one blade to the right of one of my drones, another flew under me, as I dodged another with a barrel roll.

They were everywhere! It was like these things could teleport… could they?! Shelly could lift things with her thoughts. Teleportation wasn’t ruled out. As I was lost in thought A droninja landed on my frontmost drone chopping off one of its propellers, sending a painful error through me, before it could do more shelly snatched it from its perch crushing it with the full force of her powered mind, the metal screeching as it was bent. Using the newly formed steel ball as a projectile she tossed it with as much force as she could muster into the nearest enemy, the creatures hardened body dented almost beyond recognition by the power of the shot.

Superpowers were a wonderful, WONDERFUL thing. Even without a body shelly was a force to be reckoned with. Some part deep inside of me buzzed to life and I wanted desperately to know what she would be like at her full potential.

“LEFT!!”

I was jerked out of my musings once again by Shel’s voice. Slamming on the controls in my mind I took a hard left into the vent she had been indicating, the drone with the missing propeller now just barely keeping up as a wave of droninjas now covered every wall. Just how many were there!?

“We need to go down!” shelly shouted her voice pained from her psychic battle

{huh?}

“I’ve been doing some calculations. Based on the length and directions we’ve traveled, the fluctuation in the temperature as we fly as well as my knowledge of the layout of the building in general and the fact that on our way here we moved in an upward slope, I have a what I think is a decent map of how to get where we need to go. And it starts with going down”

{You did all of that while flying two drones and fighting?}

“with a headache! Like I said, I’m pretty good at multitasking” she chipped puffing out her nonexistent chest slightly like a kid who had been complimented on a drawing. “anyway, just stay with me!”

And with that, she dove into the nearest downward-facing duct.

Despite Shelly’s brilliant plan (although I had no way of knowing if it was actually brilliant) the droninjas weren’t ones to let us off easy-

Droninjas? Droninja? Droninji?

{Shelly, what would the plural of droninja be?}

“Droninja? Is that what you’ve been calling them? Don’t call them that it's stupid.”

Droninjas then, the droninjas weren’t ones to give up easily, they could run as fast as we could fly and with their numbers, the horde was starting to catch up.

A dozen seemed to appear out of the shadows in front of us. Shel was able to halt the pounces of six of them, pulling from the air so they smashed against the ground, splattering mushrooms and being impaled on mini-tree branches. Shelly easily maneuvered around the other six. I wasn’t so lucky, While three of my four drones made it through fine, My fourth one, the one with the broken propeller was just too slow, a droninja landed on it. Its sword-like limbs piercing the hull like ice picks. I tried to shake it off by swerving in the air, but the thing barely seemed to notice. I called out to Shelly, but it was too late this time. Rearing back, the automaton drove its sword through the drone and out the other end,

I lost control and the device spiraled through the duct smashing against multiple walls as the droninja continued to stab at it, before finally hitting the ground nonfunctional. Down to forty-seven.

{they got another one…}

“Okay…okay, it's fine. We’re fine. Take this left.” She yelled swerving that direction. “It s-shouldn’t be far now…”

I don’t know if they understood English or if they had some sort of plan or programing but suddenly the droninja’s tactics changed, they stopped attacking us directly, seeming to disappear back into the shadows.

“That can’t possibly be good…”

{Maybe they just gave up…}

“doubt it. Th- they’re machines, but I don’t think they’re truly sentient l-like you. Programs don’t just give up. Take the next right you see.”

That wasn’t going to happen, because the next right we saw was blocked, completely sealed to us by a wall of blades.

“see…”

With a quick turn behind us, we saw the way that we had come was closed in the same fashion.

{can you move them?} I asked.

“n-no there are too many… and my head already hurts so much…” her voice telling me she would be in tears if it weren’t for her lack of ducts.

I guess the only way we could go now was forward. We flew on until we came to a place with a similar setup to the last fork. This time the wall was in front of us and too our left leaving only the right open to us, then it happened again, this one forcing us upward.

{They’re herding us.}

“Wow, I hadn’t figured that out! It’s not like I’m one hundred times smarter than you or anything.”

{What?}

“sorry, headaches make me bitchy…”

Another left a right and a downward slope brought us to a large open area in the vent system. This one was quite different from the one we had found ourselves in when we ran into the first droninja. It was round and dome-like, strange symbols were painted on the ceiling almost like a language, and something resembling bleachers were placed around at the edges of the ‘room’. The shattered ‘corpses’ of droninjas, crushed, stabbed, and diced into fragments by… something, covered the floor. Our five drones were forced into the center of what I could only call an arena.

‘what’s happening…?” shelly asked.

the droninjas made their horrible screeching noise in a way that almost made me think of cheering. They scrambled onto the bleachers and seemed to be preparing for a show.

thud!

{What was that!?}

Thud!

“Oh, God.”

THUD!!!

With one final thud, it burst into the room.

It wasn’t big, not when compared to a human, but it was bulky and broad. Still, if the droninja were human-sized it would be as tall as a mid-sized house, and that made it much bigger than our tiny drones. Its entire body was sharpened and covered in an armor of whirling blades that seemed to cut even the air as it moved, its arms not ending in one sword but in three, curved like talons. Its face was almost human but its metal skin and red eyes ruined the illusion, its mouth was the wrong way, a vertical slit from its nose to its chin, and unlike the empty eyes of the droninjas, its red glowing orbs sparkled with a mechanical barbaric intelligence.

It looked down at our drones, hovering within its arena, and with that, the Dronsumo roared.

It charged at us and I did the only thing I could think of, flinging one of my drones at it, not hard enough to really damage either but for a second the creature was stunned. And with my increased thinking speed, it was all I needed.

We were trapped, Shelly was in agony, I only had three drones left and she had two. We didn’t have anything that we could use to fight this thing…

Figuratively gritting her teeth, shelly threw all the mental strength as she could muster at the monster. But her efforts only had the effect of making it stumble back slightly. This still seemed to piss the dronsumo off. It swiped at her closest drone, its long blades bisecting it and sending waves of pain through us both.

[DRONES ACCOUNTED FOR: 46]

Fueled by her anger shelly lashed out with another telekinetic blow to its head, this time not focusing on the creature itself but the air in front of its face, forming a sort of punch. This time the dronsumo definitely felt it reeling back some from the force of the attack. as it recovered. It once again charged at the nearest drone to it. That was mine this time, I just barely was able to dodge out of the path of its claws. I flew behind it but just as quickly it spun trying to cut me with its other hand I was able to get out of the way as another telekinetic drive hit it in the shoulder knocking the arm off course another blow landed in its stomach forcing its center of gravity out of place and making it lose balance, as it tried to get back to its feet shelly pushed hard with the weight of her mind. the dronsumo was send rolling but caught itself after only a few tumbles. It stood up unaffected this time by Shel’s attempts to stop it. Looking around the room the dronsumo glared at each and every one of our cameras, growling in a way that seemed to say it was done playing around.

It rushed us once again, moving much faster than its bulky body would suggest possible. It came at Shelly’s remaining drone, she rolled to the side, throwing a mental punch into its face. It just ignored it, but she still managed to keep her drone mostly intact, only losing one of the landing legs to a claw.

Still, the dronsumo’s momentum sent it careening into a dark corner of the room where it seemed to melt into the shadows and disappeared. Before we even had time to question what had happened it was back falling from one of the shadowy spots in the domed ceiling directly above one of my drones.

i was completely caught off guard and couldn’t save the drone. It was crushed by the weight of the titan.

IT HAD POWERS NOW!!! Awesome! (No! not awesome. Why the fuck did I think that.)

{How do we fight this thing now?}

“I-I don’t know… Nothing I do is working anymore…” Shelly hitting the dronsumo with another ineffective strike.

There must be something I could do to help. But I didn’t have powers. Or a weapon or… hands.

{Hands…} I thought, glancing at the dronsumo. You know who else doesn’t have hands but instead very pointy blades where they should be? tiny robotic ninjas. They might be able to do some damage. But why had they attacked us in the first place? They had left us alone when we had first entered the vents. We had seen them, although we didn’t know what they were at first. So why had they turned hostile? Because the first one started screaming? No. even if that was the reason for the rest it didn’t explain why that one had attacked us. Had we entered its territory?

Maybe but, then the others should have reacted the same way when we got close. What could I do to get them to attack the dronsumo!? Unless it wasn’t the room itself. What had happened while we were there? Going through my memory files bit by bit I came up with nothing. We were near the radiator and… radiator, heat. Had the first droninja acted up because the duct was hot?

{I have an Idea}

“Bac, I’m sort of busy fighting a knife-wielding sumo wrestler robot right now!”

{No, listen. why did the droninjas attack us.}

“I don’t know! What does that have to do wit-?”

{Because of heat!!! If they overheat, I think they become aggressive. They attacked us in the radiator because it was hot. If we can turn that aggression on the dronsumo…}

“WHAT DID I TELL YOU ABOUT NAMING THINGS!!!” she cleared her ‘throat’ “also I ummm… already figured that out and- uh, totally thought of a plan exploiting that… fact”

I felt it as she sped up her mind.

“Okay, it's simple. I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing while also,” a few droninjas rose from their seats and came flying at our opponent actually scratching it with their knife hands “throwing dr- dro- uhg droninjas at this big guy. What I need you to do is well, if we’re where I think we are there should be an internal valve to redirect the hot air from the radiator here I need you to find it and turn it.”

{Okay. Got it!} I sent her the mental image of a salute, making her chuckle despite her foul mood.

I began zipping around the duct looking for anything that might be a valve or a lever as shelly continued battling.

The dronsumo brought its left arm out in a straight jab, forcing shelly to reel back and its right arm came around to trisect her. The brain just evading it in a dive down and to the left, three more ninjas came flying at the sumo, it swiped them out of the air, cutting each in two with no mercy, then it fell, sinking into its own shadow to emerge behind Shelly its claws outstretched. Shelly used the parts of the broken droninjas scattered over the floor to form a quick and dirty shield, she was barely able to keep it in shape as the monster slammed into it, it’s weight belying its size.

Taking inspiration from her previous actions in the vents she crushed her shielding into a large ball that she sent flying into the dronsumo’s chest. The robot was sent backward and before it could right itself, shelly sent seven more droninjas at it. They scrabbled down its body like ants their bladed arms scratching and scrapping leaving the sumo a little more damaged than it had been before

“ugh, why wasn’t I doing this in the first place” she cried out at a sudden sharp pain that would have been behind her eyes “oh yeah…”

but the dronsumo wasn’t done yet. It stood, shaking off the droninjas still left on it. With another roar, its arms began spinning rotating the blades at the end like the propellers that they once were

“BAC! ANY TIME NOW! I…I can’t do this for much longer!”

{I’m working on it.}

I was flying around the room, checking every inch of the wall for the valve or lever that we needed, I had even split my consciousness between my drones so that I could check two places at once. Still, I hadn’t found anything.

The dronsumo was lumbering towards Shelly’s final drone its spinning blades acting as a drill to any shield she tried to create. Giving up on protection. Shelly began pushing the sumo directly with telekinesis the was barely slowing it down, her endurance was clearly running low.

“B-BAC…” she whined, “HURRY UP, DAMN IT!”

Where was it? Where had I not looked? The ceiling, the walls, the floor, the only place left was…

{Ahg! Shit!}

“W-w-what?”

{it’s in the ring} I explained, {more specifically right behind our friend at the moment}

And as I thought there it was. Gleaming it a spot just inconvenient enough to be dangerous to reach. A valve behind the dronsumo.

“Oh… yeah, that is a ‘Shit’ moment.”

{keep throwing droninjas. Let’s end this.}

I rushed into the ring. Avoiding hurled droninjas and metal claws.

I closed in on the floor. The dronsumo deciding my drone was a target and doing its best to crush and/or stab it. I spun around blades and between its feet. it sliced at the ground as if it knew what would come next. It even began pushing its arms though the shadows to try to come at me from odd angles. But it was too late, and I was prepared this time activating the robotic arms retracted into the bottom of my drone I laned on the valve, and pushing my thrusters to the max, turned it.

PHWOOOOOOOOOOOOOSHHHH!!!

Air came rushing into the duct. Blowing our drones from their places onto the far wall. Droninjas were also sent tumbling through the room.

The wind started out room temperature but quickly heated, by the time it stopped coming in it was nearing 200 degrees Fahrenheit.

The droninjas began twitching and groaning. snapping from position to position and starting to shriek as if in agony.

{NOW!}

Grunting with effort shelly drudged up the last of her willpower against the pain as she lifted as many droninjas as she could possibly muster. With a cry she sent them in a single mass at the dronsumo, their cries reaching a pitch I would be unable to hear if I were using human ears. (God, I wish I couldn’t hear it.)

The droninja quickly began to attack the first things they saw. For most of them that was us, forcing us to begin dodging and evading their leaps once again. But for the group on the dronsumo, the first thing they saw that wasn’t each other was it. They sliced and spun hacking at the creature like a swarm of termites on a piece of plywood, the dronsumo doing it’s best to shake or slice them off. It got a few but mainly managed to cut itself more. What’s more, unlike the droninjas who became more aggressive the heat seemed to be slowing it down. it was becoming more sluggish as the tide of little robots tore away at it, already having ripped away chunks of its bladed armor. The sumo tried to escape into the shadows but the ninja’s sharing its power just followed. Desperate the dronsumo began simply slamming itself against the wall but only damaged is armor further and gave the droninjas more area to attack. It thrashed and growled but there was nothing it could do as more and more and more of the ninjas began swarming over its head. A few more thrashes, and with a final roar, that was the end of the dronsumo...

With the dronesumo’s death, the droninjas calmed. Despite the heat, it seemed like something had changed in them. They began ticking and slowing until each eventually came to a full stop. Then there was a ding in my head.

BIOLING!

[30 DRONINJAS ADDED TO SYSTEM

3D PRINTER TEMPLATE FOR DRONINJA ADDED TO SYSTEM

3D PRINTER TEMPLATE FOR DRONSUMO ADDED TO SYSTEM]

{huh, weird. Some of them are ours now. Also, do we have a 3D printer?}

“c-cool, let's hurry up and get out of these vents to fix that wiring, then I’m going to sleep for a few years,” she stated already set to doze off “oh, and to your question. Yeah, it’s down the hall from our lab. Why?”

{I got templets for those guys.}

“that’s…strange… we didn't put them in a scanner, did we? But I don’t have the energy to think about it. Come'on, let’s go.”

With that shelly began leading us out of the vent system in silence. with us only getting lost a few times soon we were out and in a hallway I had never seen before.