Four years in the past.

A young girl, scarcely more than a decade old, lay on the hospital bed, eyes closed, chest barely moving with her slow breaths. She had a respirator over her face, numerous tubes and wires connected to various points on her body, and a vital monitor beeping with her heartbeat. A woman in a nun’s habit stood by the side of the bed, holding the girl’s hand.

Two men entered the room, one in a doctor’s scrubs, the other in a suit and sunglasses. The nun turned to face them.

“Doctor?”

The doctor just shook his head. Tears filled the nun’s eyes.

“If we had caught it earlier, sent her to a better hospital, then maybe, but…there’s nothing I can do now.”

The nun slowly nodded.

“I understand.”

“But…this man wanted to meet with you.”

The man in the suit walked forward, and extended his hand.

“Gaute Ottosen.”

The woman rose and shook his hand.

“Sister Johanna.”

The man nodded.

“Sister, we have a proposal for you.”

She narrowed her eyes.

“Go on.”

“We have a new procedure. Highly experimental, highly risky, low chance of success. Honestly, failure is the most likely outcome.”

Sister Johanna’s eyes widened for a moment before she shook her head.

“I imagine such a procedure would be quite expensive, Director Ottosen. My orphanage has nothing to spare.”

Director Ottosen shook his head.

“Given the low probability of success, the procedure will be free of charge, should you agree to it. If I am honest, it’s more a science experiment to give us data for future procedures than an actual treatment, so it would be unethical of us to charge you for it.”

He took off his glasses to look Sister Johanna in the eye.

“But there’s a chance. Just a chance.”

Sister Johanna met his gaze for a minute, before turning to look at the girl. She walked over and gently brushed the girl’s forehead.

“...Do what you can for her.”

Director Ottosen nodded and pulled out a clipboard and a pen. Sister Johanna signed the bottom, and then Director Ottosen left the room.

As he exited the door he smirked.

“No, Sister. It is not what we can do for her. It is what she will do for us.”

Back in the present day.

Tesla Titan strolled through the facility, humming a tune as he swung his arms. Lightning arced across the hall, war-bots trembling and emitting puffs of smoke before falling to the ground. The bullets bouncing off his suit gave a nice little beat to his impromptu song.

“So much for fancy robots. Still no match for Soviet Tesla suit, da?”

He came to a glass overpass, and shattered the wall. He extended his hands and filled the factory with lightning, circuits popping and small fires breaking out across the room. He continued to hum as he moved into the gymnasium arena.

The bots here fared no better than the ones before.

Finally the Tesla Titan came to a large vault door. He nodded to himself.

“Impressive security. Would take long time to crack. But I always bring special key.”

Tesla Titan reached to a pack tied to his suit. And pulled out a bomb.

A very big bomb.

“From Russia with love.”

Bob watched a monitor along with Director Ottosen.

“Your bots seem to have failed, Director.”

Director Ottosen winced.

“Admittedly, Tesla Titan is perhaps the worst of the lot for them. But the Non-Standard Leashed-Intelligence Cybernetic Enforcer can handle him! What’s our status?”

“Systems are booting up, running diagnostics now!”

Bob watched as the Tesla Titan planted a large package on the vault door.

“I don’t believe you have time for diagnostics.”

“The Arbiter is right. Activate it, now.”

“Sir…”

“Just do it! We’ve run plenty of tests, we can work out the bugs after the superhero assault!”

Bob turned to face the girl. The scientists removed all but one cable, and then hit enter on the keyboard.

An orange-red light began to shine in the armor’s chest. Her robotic left eye began to glow red. Suddenly her organic eye shot open. She slowly rose from the table, reaching up to disconnect the final cable from her skull. She took two steps forward, standing perfectly straight.

She opened her mouth and spoke in a straight and steady voice without intonation or deviation. There was a light metallic echo behind her words.

“Status Report: All Systems Online. Diagnostics aborted by administrator override. NSLICE-000P awaiting orders.”

Director Ottosen smiled.

“This facility is under attack by the ILS. Please eliminate the Tesla Titan, if you would.”

“Acknowledgement: Affirmative. Activating combat mode. NSLICE-000P moving to engage.”

The metal on the left side of her head extended out until her entire head was encased in metal, no trace of her human body left visible. Her right hand opened up, the palm and fingers folding back, and a barrel extended from her arm. She turned to the door and began to walk out, heavy steps clanking on the floor in an unerring rhythm.

Director Ottosen and Bob turned back towards the monitor.

“And so the die is cast! Prepare to see the fruits of our labor, Sir Arbiter.”

Bob remained silent as his eyes narrowed.

BOOM!

Tesla Titan’s view was filled with fire and smoke, but his suit held back the heat and filtered the air. He let out a laugh as the smoke began to clear.

“That was most fun. I see why Tina likes so much.”

There was a massive hole in the vault door. Tesla Titan squeezed through, jagged metal edges screeching against his suit. He took up position a looked around.

“That is weird. Should be last line of defense, no?”

Then he heard the metallic clanks on the ground.

Another war-bot rounded the corner of the hall. This one seemed a bit smoother and shorter than the others. The war-bot lifted its right arm, which had a barrel instead of a hand.

“Status Report: Target acquired. Engaging.”

The machine spit lead down the hall.

Tesla Titan laughed as the bullets plinked off his armor.

“Maybe they run out of bots? Is good for me.”

He raised his hand, charge building within it. He sent a single bolt forward…

Right before he launched his bolt, the war-bot leapt to the side, rolling along the ground. When it stood back up, its right arm had transformed back in a hand. Instead, it lifted its left arm, holding out a fist towards Tesla Titan.

“Observation: Target armor above expected parameters. Adapting…anti-tank missile engaged.”

A small panel opened on the war-bot’s left arm, a small missile rose out of it.

“Interesting, very interesting. But it will take more than tank missile to stop Tesla Titan!”

Tesla Titan lifted his arms, filling the air with lightning as the missile fired. Lightning struck the small projectile and it exploded mid-air. The lightning surged forward, zapping the war-bot. The machine held out both arms, palms facing out.

“Statement: Engaging Gravity Barrier.”

The war-bot’s core and hands glowed with purple light, and the machine was surrounded by a sphere of purple light. Lightning hissed as it struck against the barrier. The glow of the machine flickered, but the barrier held.

And then the lightning stopped.

The war-bot dropped the barrier, moving its palms forward.

A shadow burst from the lingering smoke of the missile, and the Tesla Titan slammed his shoulder into the war-bot. The small machine flew through the air, slamming into the wall and cracking it.

Tesla Titan ran towards the machine, hands held out.

“If I cannot fry, then I will crush!”

Tesla Titan moved to grab the machine in his arms…

CLANK!

“Huh?”

He blinked several times.

His arms had stopped mid-air.

Tiny hands gripped his. The war-bot looked up at him. He tensed his muscles and pushed into the machine.

The war-bot didn’t budge.

Tesla Titan let out a grunt and really put his back into it.

The war-bot didn’t budge.

Tesla Titan started to sweat.

And the war-bot started to push back.

Man and metal groaned as the war-bot pushed on his hands, his fingers bending back.

“Gravity Transfer Initiated.”

The war-bot’s hands glowed purple once more. The floor tiles cracked beneath its feet.

Tesla Titan let out a gasp. He found himself floating.

The tiny machine lifted his massive suit with a single hand. The other hand pulled back and clenched into a fist.

BAM!

Tesla Titan groaned as a punch to the gut sent him flying.

“Gravity Transfer canceled.”

And he cried out as he slammed into the far wall, breaking straight through it.

“Statement: Close combat protocols engaged.”

Tesla Titan barely had time to stand when a metallic fist struck his face.

He lifted his arms to block.

A fist jabbed his side.

He went on the offensive, swinging with a wild haymaker.

The machine ducked under his mighty blow and swung its elbow into his torso.

He pulled himself up and slammed down on the ground with both his fists.

The machine rolled underneath the Titan, coming to a crouch with both palms facing the man.

“Gravity Push.”

Two purple bolts slammed into Tesla Titan’s back, sending him stumbling forward. He grit his teeth and filled his suit with lightning…

“Status Report: Scan of hostile hardware complete. Critical component located.”

The machine jumped on his back, and thrust its hand between the plates of his armor. Lightning arced across the bot, but it remained unphased.

CRACK!

Metal broke as the machine ripped its hand back, holding a metal tube, lighting still surging from it. Tesla Titan’s eyes widened.

And his suit fell forward, no longer responding to his commands.

Back in the lab, silence hung in the air as they watched the Tesla Titan fall to the ground.

“...It seems congratulations are in order, Director.”

Director Ottosen nodded.

“This is just the tiniest taste of our weapon’s true potential.”

Bob nodded.

“The combat abilities are exceptional, but I am most impressed by the control scheme. For the…weapon to function this well off of a simple oral command is well beyond the capabilities of most AI.”

“Of course, the techno-organic integration is our crowning achievement. I believe the results speak for itself.”

“I do wonder, how does your IFF function? Is it limited to pre-programmed handlers?”

Dr. Ottosen smiled.

“Oh that’s another benefit of the Leashed-Intelligence system. The NSLICE has the best of human recognition and computer memory and precision. Anything that works for the Concordat, the NSLICE will use as well.”

“I presume it is already familiar with Concordat procedure, then?”

“Naturally, the NSLICE was built entirely for the Concordat, of course. The NSLICE will automatically obey any Concordat personnel of sufficiently high rank, so long as the order does not conflict with previous orders of higher priority. Well, again we haven’t worked out all the kinks in the leashing, but at this point you could take the NSLICE to the Steward yourself with 90% expected compliance. We just need to verify that no edge cases will result from the kinks.”

Bob nodded to himself.

“Good.”

Then he pulled out a gun and shot Dr. Ottosen in the head.

He spun around, gun raised, as the scientists processed what happened and began to scream.

A few moments later he was done.

He rushed over to the monitor. NSLICE-000P was standing over the Tesla Titan, scanning for weak points in the armor. Bob quickly hit a button on the monitor.

“NSCLICE-000P, this is an Arbiter of Sorrow. Authority code 3H89-X32.”

NSLICE-000P looked away from the fallen hero and stood up straight.

“Acknowledgement: Code accepted. Command authority registered. Awaiting command from Arbiter.”

“Cease combat. Move Tesla Titan to a safe distance outside the facility, alive and unharmed, then return to the lab.”

“Affirmative.”

NSLICE-000P picked up the Tesla Titan, carrying him over her shoulder, and began to walk towards the entrance of the facility.

Bob let out a sigh, and then walked out of the room.

Check for more doomsday weapons first, then worry about the killer robot girl, then find a way out of here undetected, then worry about the ILS.

Heroes and mad scientists are so annoying.