The elevator was taking quite a long while to take Gary to the bottom. The hunger was now beginning to wear Gary down. Worse than the hunger was the thirst. Having ridden most of the way here, he hadn't managed to drink from the drinking fountains found on the surface. The underground seemed to lack such things. Of course there was also the fact that he was being chased. He'd managed to piss within the maintenance tunnels. Gary decided to close his eyes, and take a short nap.

Ding. He finally reached the bottom. Having roused himself from his sleep, he started searching. His job wasn't merely to reach the bottom of this spire, but to retrieve a special cube. He didn't know what it did, but he would apparently be 'highly rewarded' for its retrieval. Gary did not consider himself an idiot, and assumed that the cube, regardless of what it could do, would be very valuable. Valuable enough to get him a good meal, and a trip away from whoever his 'benefactors' were. Anyone vile enough to use clone soldiers in this manner was not to be trusted.

The jet-black walls of the maintenance tunnels held no cracks for Gary to determine where anything was. Were it not for the lights, he would likely have kept running into the walls. After some walking Gary found a corpse. There were actually two corpses. A clone of Gary in two pieces holding a keycard, and a metallic beast charred black. Behind them there was a door. Gary stepped over the dead bodies, took the keycard, and went to open the door. He didn't mind seeing his own corpse. It wasn't truly him. He thought that might make him seem disturbed. Which he felt wouldn't be an inaccurate assessment.

The door slid open. On the other side, a white, sterile hallway could be seen. Glass windows revealed laboratories. The corpses of clones, and metal beasts were strewn about the place. Some of the walls had black marks. The floors were stained by pools of blood.

"Holy shit." exclaimed Gary. He hoped that he wasn't too late to claim the cube. This trip would have been all for nothing if that was the case. Of course how he would escape this city, and how he would go about selling an unknown cube was currently beyond him. He would have to cross those bridges when he got to them.

Gary could hear someone speaking within one of the labs. He snuck his way over to it past the bodies, the blood, and broken shards of glass. In his effort to avoid the glass he'd managed to cover his bare feet in blood. He was disgusted, even if it was technically his own blood. The torn giblets of other Garys made him very happy that he had not stuck around long enough to face his metal monster. As he entered the lab he saw an open door with stairs leading downwards. The voice was coming from there. He snuck his way over, and looked down. At the bottom he saw four clones in front of a door way, a man could be seen standing in front of the windows. He was the one speaking.

"...so you see this lower section of the tower was a massive foundry. I produced everything the city would need. Originally only the spires were the only part of the city. Each spire being its own self-contained city..." the man spoke.

Gary had made a decision. He lifted up his plasma rifle, and sprayed into the space the clones occupied. Their lives ended Gary made his way down the steps.

"How could you do that! They were your brothers!" The man yelled incredulously

"What? I'm an only child." Replied Gary.

"You're a clone!" yelled the man.

"I guess this body is, but I'm pretty sure I'm unique." replied Gary "Anyways enough of that do you know where I might find a certain cube?'

The man regained his composure. He was tall, lanky, with brown hair, and stubble on his chin. He wore a lab coat, and was only mildly attractive." Ah yes the cube. I have it with me, but first you have to listen to the story of what happened to my city. Then I'll give you the cube."

"Why?" asked Gary.

"I can't just let the history of my city just disappear." replied the man.

"Ok... and what's to stop me from shooting you?" Gary asked.

"Well this door is reinforced." replied the man. "I'm Ezekiel by the way."

Gary sighed. "Gary. Do you know if there's anything to eat or drink, I have a feeling that this is going to be a long story."

"Whoa you even gave yourself a name! There should be a minifridge in the lab." replied Ezekiel. Gary thanked him.

"...Most everyone took their vehicles, and flew off the greener pastures. The metal custodians eventually 'cleaned' the entire city. Of course they kept their rampage only to the buildings. Anything that takes even a single step in the front door is classified as garbage, consumed, and turned into biofuel. Luckily the restraints we put on the AI only allow it to send one custodian at a time for every 'piece' of garbage, so once you kill your custodian you should be safe so long as you don't enter any other buildings. Anyways that's the tell of the rise and fall of Solarpunk Heaven" Ezekiel finished his story.

"Jesus." Replied Gary, while munching on a sandwich, having learned far more than he cared about a city he would never return to again. "When did this all happen?"

"Hmm? Oh just last week." replied Ezekiel.