“The Andy”

He pointed to an ancient building in front of me that registered as a communications officer with a shot-up sign. It was a desert saloon. Built upon the ruins of a collective head office.

“I'm going to go inside and talk, you to wait in there. I want you to meet someone.”

The building was a metallic stained grey. The windows were clear and shiny. A neon sign saying THE ANDY showed in front. Ellis walked forward and the automatic door sprung open.

A robot in a scorched bulletproof vest and helmet asked for our weapons. I placed my pistol on the metal table in front. The general placed two pistols, a long-bladed shimmering energy knife, and a grenade down. The robot moved to check the duffle bag but Ellis whispered something in the robot's ear and he nodded as the duffle bags went unchecked. Inside the bar was paved with the same wood as the ship. The same ruffians populated its scratched wooden tables as they did outside and a long Maplewood bar tended by robots stood in front.

The floor was relatively clean and the room dimly lit, faint blood splattered the service door, it seemed despite what looked to be years of scrubbing it still had not been able to be removed. A food service station and vending machines for ammo stood to the side of the room, their electronic screens flashing ancient advertisements and pixelated visuals. The bar suddenly turned quiet. Every breath heard from a multitude away every murmur halted in seconds. The robots in front slicked back an insatiable curiosity flashed in their cold eyes.

The town hadn't seen someone like the general in ages, only death, hardship and blood money. A robot moved forward. It was a scarred type two operation model. Limited responses, fastest serving time. The grey human-shaped mass of metal slithered forward. The bar continued in complete silence Ellis strode and approached the table slamming his hand on the counter.

“Hello, Good Sir… What can I do for you today.” it asked.

“I'd like to see her” he replied.

“.... My responses are limited, please rephrase your question”

“I would like to see the owner!” he shouted.

“.... My responses are limited, please rephrase your question”

Ellis slammed his palm into his face and stuttered a mumble of words. Ruining the effect he had on the crowd.

“Can I please see your manager?” he coughed

“Right away!” the robot replied

Ellis and I waited in the establishment. He motioned to a second robot who poured two drinks out of a glass pitcher. I ordered water and Tobago ordered some form of non-alcoholic drink. We sat at the bar for a few minutes waiting for a response.

A cry echoed from the closed iron blast doors behind the shop. The doors slunk open with a satisfying hiss. Out Stepped a single hooded figure. The bar remained quiet. The figure reached out a pale hand, grabbed one of the bags, unzipped it, peered at its contents, and waved Ellis inside. I followed but was stopped in my tracks. I waited outside, the residents of the bar looked at me, some almost growling, others intently staring. I continued to stand, one, a scruffy-looking bearded bandit wearing a tattered hat approached me, his breath stunk of alcohol. The robot beside me pulled out a rugged sawed-off shotgun and the man yelped before he slinked back to his table, a whimper in his step.

I stood leaning against the wall as Ellis was rushed behind the blast doors. I sat down at the counter and waited for him twiddling my thumbs on my lap. I could sense the eyes of the bar resting on my shoulders as I sat cloaked. A few seconds later the doors opened again and I walked inside hurrying past the serving bots and into a dimly lit room.

Ellis backed into a corner the hooded figure dumping the bags on an oaken table. The figure then tossed back its hood to reveal an intricate plastic and metal face. It had facial features similar to a female and was visibly robotic, its skin a pale metallic grey and eyes a luminescent bright blue. The creatures' gloved hands moved at an extreme pace to open the duffle bags and stock shelves of weaponry in perfect order.

Ellis moved forward and it spoke.

“General… I haven’t seen you for some time, who is this?” she spoke her voice hazy.

“This is John Taylor… I picked him up a few days ago from a recent drop. I gave you a shipment of parts it was mainly weaponry yet there is some you can use” he said

She scanned through the duffle bags and took a few alien devices from it. Plugging them into nearby surfaces. The robot which stood before me was visibly different. It moved differently, talked differently and had an almost human appearance. The room around me was one covered in technology and weapons. A blanket of arrays was laid upon the walls, hundreds of generators and screens placed around the room and a single desk laden with keyboards to control it all.

“Allow me to introduce myself” I spoke suddenly, sticking an outstretched hand to the robot.

“I am Dr. Qwen Shaw,” she said

She took my hand and shook it. For a few brief moments, we stood in complete silence before Ellis, walked forward and showed her a chart on a small tablet. Then her eyes lit up with excitement, motioning me to a nearby seat that was rather uninviting in nature. The chair was surrounded by a hazy mess of wires and she shoved a brain neural net on my head. With inhuman speed, she typed into the mess of panels and controls showing Ellis the flowing data on the screen. For a few minutes, once more we all sat in awkward silence, her eyes quickly scanning the device.

“This is amazing… the collective when they realize what they have done. They will come for him” she said

“What do you see?” Ellis hobbled over and I tried to get up but was gently forced back into the chair.

“He has no injuries yet he also has a brain abnormality… he's even better than me. The same type of deformity yet the gene is three hundred times more dominant. He can retry without a paralyzation”

“What do you mean like you?” I was shivering in the chair now as the two seemed to enjoy my brain analysis.

“I was paralyzed when I fell, I was like you, dropped. Yet I was of more significance. I had a brain deformation of a similar kind, however, mine was of a smaller scale. I escaped without an injury, I escaped with the only removal of my skin.

“What?” I breathed

“Yeah, highly unlucky. My body decided to remove itself. It is safe to ascertain my internal organs and brain were splattered around the ground when I first came. Luckily for me, a group of robots had been watching me drop. It is very surprising they didn't use me for fertilizer, if they had not been Archius guard I would be dead. Yet this same gene which is dominant in me is dominant in you, and you don’t seem to have a scratch.``

“What does it mean,” I said

“I mainly just means you will be able to retry, the initial scans seemed boring, and plainly uninteresting however the new and more in-depth scans revealed the deformation, it's a wonder if they even catch it.”

“Dr. Shaw here worked for the Collective, 13 years before she was charged with treason. Aiding the escape of three hostages.”

“The price I had to pay made my actions futile as they were hunted down and killed not three days after.

"It still was noble" Ellis replied.

She stood still for a moment, holding her breath.

"I will carry these scars until the end of time,” she said.

For a short while of time, the two spoke in hushed whispers as a series of experiments were conducted on me. A few times I heard various snip bits of information such as the term bargaining chip and some theories on brain formation.

“About the maze?... How did you exit?” she asked quickly, playing with a blowtorch in her hand.

“I pulled out the neural net from the back of my head” I replied mumbling

I grazed my hand across the back of my head, wondering if any scars would still be seen.”

“Pulled out? That… that’s impossible the only way would be if you died in the maze” she stated

“Did you?” she looked at me puzzled

“Die in the maze? No, I simply realized I would not succeed” I hastily spoke.

“The mission was futile?” she questioned.

“Yes the mission was futile” I shifted my eyes around the compartment and waited in silence.

“ If they discover this awareness the Collective will not stop to repossess your friend.” She spoke to Ellis ignoring my presence.

“How long until they find out?”

“Due to the fact he removed the net… I would say approximately 1-3 hours, if not now.”

Tobago paced across the room, his eyes deep in thought.

“If he pulled the neural net from the back of his head would they have not caught it on security footage? What about Matenience workers?” he asked.

“Its possible and without a doubt bound to happen… if what I see is true, he needs to go off-planet or anywhere that the Collective can not reach” she replied

I sat up, uncomfortable in the chair. Brushing back my hair I posed a question.

“What do we do?.. I can’t risk your lives?”

Ellis turned and responded.

“By taking you in and making you one of my own, I have already bound my services to you, you did not ask for my help those days ago… I know of one way we can ensure your survival. There is a possibility we can transport him to Archius. From there..”

Qwen pitched into the conversation finishing his sentence.

“We can have him transported to Kestle? Or the UNOT? From there he can be used as a bargaining chip, much like you.”

“Bargaining chip?” I shouted

The idea of becoming some sort of commodity to be bought and sold to the collective was not one which was in my favour.

They both paused for a few moments unaware of what to say.

“What will happen to me if I leave Archius? Is it even possible?” I questioned

“The entire purpose of a bargaining chip is you can be used to tempt the robot which controls the collective, although the president will see you simply as another fowl distraction she may see you as a short-cut or messiah to the damned.

If we get you to Kestle we can expand and continue the study of futurity perhaps uncovering the secrets for ourselves or giving you to them in return for insurance.”

In a split second, I knew what I had to do. Grabbing a pistol from a nearby table with lightning-fast reflexes I startled them both and pointed the barrel at the general’s head. I was never going to pull the trigger and plunge myself into the depths of anarchy, but spending the rest of eternity as a lab rat for mind testing did not sound admissable.

The Doctor operating almost as fast as me had an energy knife to my throught a millisecond later. Though too late to end the mortal standoff

I stared into Ellis’s eyes, he stared back.

“Listen? What choice do you have? The collective will surely find you, by now I have no doubt a satellite has traced your location to this very spot. You have two choices. Die a collective slave, with no honour and your name forgotten in the blowing sands of time. Or you can sacrifice your life to save those of others, have proper and humanitarian treatment arranged by a government that cares about you, and be remembered as a hero.” he spoke

I weighed the options, the collective would surely find me, kill those who are my friends and make me spend the rest of my life in an ice-cube constantly being preserved and awakened to perform a collage of tests while remaining a specimen, all freedom, humanity and dignity stripped from a rotting corpse. Yet there was always a possibility I could escape, find a way off the planet and ditch the general and his comrades to speed across the galaxy. Far away from both the reach of Kestle and The Collective. How hard could it be? There would always be another planet, another city, another person, another place for me to hide. From there I chose my objective. Hands shaking I slowly recalled the gun, turning on safety and placing it on the wood table. Sweat glimmered down the side of my face, a tear dripping from my killer eyes.

I picked up a nearby washcloth to wipe my face as the two relaxed, lowering the tension in the room.

“So what's the plan?” I asked greasing back my hair with my hand.

The three of us hovered around a set of maps and computer diagrams. All were highly detailed layouts of the land and were quite beautiful to cast a glance upon. Some bore the fragrance and delicacy of many years while others had the look of fine laminated paper and lit up screens.

“The plan goes like this: fly cloaked for three days until you reach the forests where nature will camouflage any trails and limit any persons, you stop at Ionius-Major for resupply and console the Colonel. We continue hopefully with an armed escort to the militia base of Quenite-3. From there hug the valley and canyons until you reach gate-5. From there, a smuggler will extract you and a handful of officials, us two as a matter of fact to reach Kestle’s far outpost Vernon 3.'' She used a chewed pencil to guide us through the map.

“From Vernon 3, we will use you as a bargaining chip.”

“We?” I asked

Ellis smiled and asked her a question.

“It seems you will be joining us?”

Shaw started packing a medium-sized backpack and suitcase, stuffing them with various technological materials.

“It may be the only chance for me to get off of this damn rock” she replied.

Suddenly a shockwave hit the tavern. Pieces of wood and metal splintered from their places as the entire ground began to crumble. The overall compound, however, held fast the concrete keeping its shape. I was thrown off of my feet to collapse in a mesh of wires.

I was rushed outside by Ellis and the robot, both grabbed pistols from a nearby stand. A rifle was thrown into my hand. We all ran out of the bar to see the customers lay down weapons continually firing outside of the nearby window. They had broken the glass into shards on the ground and the two service robots now bore arms of assault rifles.

The mud-baked town of Arrakis had sprung to life. Anti-air cannons blasted into the open sky. Energy particles and bullets stream through the streets and up into the air. A ray of fire came down from the heavens. Twenty mercenaries ran onto the streets, a few of them had gotten into an APC and were using a heavy energy distorter to pummel the sand-whipped clouds. The mercenaries wore makeshift armour all carrying the distinctive banner of a clenched fist on their arms. The hooded robot threw off her cloak to reveal a machine body

. It seemed a mix of cybernetics and organics. Underneath she wore a green jumpsuit that had a section removed to reveal a generator exhaust port. The mayor's soldiers ran onto the streets and soon all four anti-aircraft guns were firing east.

The streets and makeshift buildings came to life as the orbiter itself opened fire. The citizens wept out in fear as their masters from afar lay waste to an entire block with one swipe of an energy Laser. Soon I opened my eyes after a blinding particle blast, to look across the desert sands, look across the piles of bodies and the ashen corpses to see the hell which lay beyond the town's outer border.

The anti-air guns were firing at full effect now. Pounding the sky with potent whisps of smoke. A ship was on the horizon, a vessel that resembled a laterally inverted grey oval. The anti-aircraft guns were having some effect yet the Orbiter itself was attacking them.

“This is no plan to destroy all of the town's inhabitants or stop smugglers, the orbiter itself would have wiped us out with single artillery fire. They have come for him”

“Did you cloak your ship?”

“The mechanism broke three months ago"

"Broke, how?" she cried.

"A raider was taking fire at my ship with a burst rifle”

“There's your answer”

“Whatever we do, We can not let Taylor here fall into their hands. Get him to my ship, I advise you to move as well. Your computer may have salvageable parts.” he said

“Can we fight?” I asked

“We can try, but with the orbiter itself we will be simply delaying the inevitable” she replied.

She then commanded her two service robots and went back into the bar, coming out with two crates of supplies and backpacks full of gear. She held a heavy-grade electricity gun which normally would have been an encampment weapon like it was a simple wooden rifle. A sign of bio-enhanced strength.

The bandits continued to open fire, yet this time the craft was getting closer. Ellis used the butt of his gun to smash open the window of a nearby land craft ordering us to get inside. Dr. Shaw placed the heavy gun on top of the vehicle and I jumped on top as well, a mixture of mud and blood staining my shoes and the ground below. The craft was a simple car, it had a cracked windshield and a dusty but rather clean interior.

“You live here, wouldn’t you have a vehicle?” I asked, almost screaming as Ellis hot-wired the craft.

“My ship is at the port… This is faster”

The three drove head-on, in the distance, the T-52 squad had just reached the barrier of the small town. The robots themselves now had the back door open. Holding onto the side of their craft they clutched onto the metal as the craft moved forward preparing to jump onto the streets and seek out their prey. The ship rammed through the barrage of bullets that streamed towards it, the commanding robot was however still inside the craft along with a pilot, his wired hand clasped an iron-clad transmitter.

“This is T-52-3… Orbiter we need aerial strike 555 6173 1972 over” it spoke metallically

A human voice replied.

“Roger that Synth, We are firing on those coordinates now, remember do not kill the target we need him back alive in perfect condition… wait, pause on all shelling… we have…. we have incoming”

The secondary light guns of the orbiter space-port stopped firing their pellet of measly explosives. A sight that surprised all on the ground and caused one of the anti-air cannons to fire upon the T-52 squad-craft and lay a hit, striking the ship dead center and causing it to spiral out of control and crashland in the outskirts of the town.

Then the unspeakable happened, something which would haunt those who dare saw it until the day they die. The orbiter itself lit up with a blue pulse of energy and for the first time in over 10 years since the great slaughter of Kestle itself, the command station started firing at full force clearing the cobwebs from its ancient military ranks. A sight which was one to be written into tales of yore, its mighty guns pounded through the solar system, deafening the ears of many. Why or how it came to be no one knows, but at that time some cursed scientist had detected something, and commands had spread like wildfire through the floating city of iron.

Suddenly through all of the beacons, substations, and the massive amount of space traffic which lead to the Collective homeworld, a black hole opened in the void of space. The cut in space-time was only open for a split second but it was still enough to cause every single ship, including the orbiter to do a mandatory course correction. The black-hole then disappeared into thin air and there stood a valiant vessel of medium proportions. It stood still for a single moment to soon speed forward basking in the radiance of the armada which blocked its path.

The craft was completely black and moved at an insatiable speed. Twelve of the collectives scout ships came forward and the civilian space-craft traffic stopped in their tracks, There were 6 planets, thirty-one space stations, 263 freight vessels, 761 civilian vessels, and 352 military vessels in the Collectives solar system. All stopped or stood in complete awe. The twelve scoutships drifted forward and a supernova class ship, a destroyer of 10,000 beings, thrust to the position of the enemy vessel. They opened channels and tried to contact the ship which had just appeared, the hunk of black metal, no it was no metal, the ship which was shown in front of them was flesh. It showed up on all of their screens and scanners to be made of organic materials, yet they could clearly see a door, a windshield, and what looked to be thrusters. The entity drifted forward, a collective scoutship tried to disable it with a single blast of its ion weapons however it continued, travelling across their solar system at an incomparable speed.

All of the vessels in the area opened fire in sync. Their bullets tore into the ship ripping off chunks at a time their energy pulses cut off huge amounts of its blackened flesh yet none of it mattered to the ship and its driver, the ship was not hollow and for every cut or laceration, it continued pressing on. Hurdling into the hoard of civilians and space-dwellers. Its destination is the Garbage Planet and the Orbiter. Seeing their bullets weren’t stopping the craft the collective sent out a battlehind ship to ram it.

The heavily armed gunship went full thrust and prepared to thow itself at the horrific foe. Yet when it first touched the skin of the creature the black ooze latched itself onto the metal hull of its attacker, it crept over the metal surface stretching out with a strange tenacity.

Soon the craft had completely engulfed its foe the ship's guns fired once or twice and all that could be heard on the military radio was static and the harrowing screams of the damned who were trapped inside. Horrible screams, shrieks of agonizing death sent shivers down the commander of the supernova's spine.

The commander turned to his first mate and shrieked out a swift order. The supernova then opened fire unleashing its unrelenting fury upon its enemy. This time it showed no mercy lacerating huge chunks of the beast once more yet still it pressed on caring nothing about the dead flesh which lay floating in the space behind. The orbiter itself then opened fire, hundreds of barrage cannons and ion weapons firing at the same time, the full force concentrated on the center of the beast.

The blackened creature’s skin tore apart and apart and apart. It was beautifully terrifying, the sight of the most powerful navy in the known galaxy unable to destroy a single mass of organics, normally these potent guns would destroy battleships, decimate crews and reduce the hopes and dreams of thousands if not millions to ashes, these were guns known as city killers, and devastators, having reduced civilizations and entire grand armadas to nothing but swirling mixtures of ashes and scarred bones.

Soon it was no match for the full force of the navy. The space-stations guns ripped through the center and the monster peeled back its skin to reveal a single magnificent metal ship. It was the reciprocal of its forebearer, something of immense skill and beauty. Then the homeworld of the Collective itself shot out a fiery beam of energy and hit the ship full force.

Normally even Supernovas or other heavy-class freighters would have been reduced to mere atoms when facing that kind of raw power. Instead, the ship broke again. The outer vessel took the full blow of the blast and a smaller craft was soon ejected. The outer craft had been placed in such a position that the shield which surrounded the planet of the mindless was completely depleted for the ship itself reflected the entire concentration onto the ground below.

The mass of rock was not destroyed nor any land burned however the ship and the orbiter's shield generator blew. This craft similar to its forecommer was quickly disabled by the slightest blow of a scoutship and its pilot steered the seldom remains of the monolith, skillfully dodging the remaining pitiful attacks by the frightened soldiers and battlegrounds.

The pilot was as skilled as the beast from whence it came. With the disabled shield soon to repair itself and the Collective cities on the garbage planet setting up their own personal shields it shuttered towards a settlement on the garbage planet. Trailing a mix of smoke and tarnished metal behind it. It steered towards New Arrakis, a course from which it was sure to never return. Meanwhile, an Epsilon class ship sped forward and went to land on the surface of the planet. Roughly the size of two Earth aircraft carriers it settled on the desert sands to execute or find whatever corroded mutilated scrap remained of the mysterious craft.

In the meantime, the entire solar system, a population of some thirteen billion, looked up into the sky or across frosted window panes into an abyss of stars. Fear, love, and hate dominate their watchful eyes.