[/Pinpointing_waypoint3]

[/waypoint3_pinned]

[/Updating_navmap]

The machine quickly redraws the old thermal-imaging map into new visible light-thermal image combo map backtracks to where it severed leg's last known location. The newly redrawn map is much more accurate and detailed while staying nearly the same in term of file size as the ways the machine compresses those data are the same.

[/Scanning_surface_area...]

The machine decides to slow down just a little bit as it moves its head left and right to scan the ground and the walls of the tunnel in front of it as the terrain changes from solid rocky area to mushy dirt ground, it seems like the machine has arrived in the upper area of the cave, an area that usually covered with bat poops everywhere, but now, the machine can not see any bats nor signs of bat living in the area, instead the machine notices a lot of footprints of some kind of creatures, and judging by the shape, size and number of footprints, the machine guesses it belong to the bugs, a large group of big and small bugs going on a hunt, probably.

[/Situational_alertness: Medium]

The machine takes notice of the discovery it just made and resumes its search for the severed leg, the quicker the machine recover its leg, the higher the chance the machine can avoid meanless confrontation against the hostile bugs.

[/Movement_detected]

[/Visual_contact]

But before the machine could leave the area, a blurry figure appears in its field of view as the machine halts and 'stares' at the figure motionlessly, the figure can be seen resembling a humanoid being in a suit of black, rusty armor and it is approaching the machine very slowly. Stopping 20 meters away from the machine, the figure now is staring back at the machine for 5 minutes straight. For 5 minutes both the machine and the unknown black knight just do a random, awkwardly quiet staring contest for no apparent reasons.

[/Lifeform_tagged]

The figure slowly raises its left arm up and points to the same direction, and as the machine moves its head slightly to see what the figure is pointing at, the machine sees the path where the machine once came from after its first battle against the bugs, its missing leg could be in that area.

The machine quickly looks back at the figure as its primary processor looks up the list of actions the machine should take to show its gratitude to the unknown black knight, but it is all for naught as all the machine could see now is a pile of mangled dead bugs sitting on the place the black knight once stood. And as the machine moves its head a bit further to the right, the machine begins to notice entrails of dead bugs and lizards are scattered on the dirt walls and it is standing in a puddle of dried blood.

[/Visual_anomaly_detected: Diagnosing system]

The machine quietly moves out of the puddle of dried blood as its sticky Y-shaped foot sinks down into the soft soil, the machine is uncertain what just happened, but the path to its severed leg is still there, the machine is certain that it is best to just leave the place as soon as possible to finish its job and return to the colony for a checkup.

But as the machine enters and quickly moves deeper into the path, the machine suddenly notices it has arrived in the same spot where it first saw the bugs' trails. When the machine turns around, the machine can see itself standing right in front of the machine.

[/System_diagnose_return_no_result]

As Pioneer's CPUs are stunned and baffled of the scene in front of it, its secondary processor calls for a forced reboot for the primary processor as it takes over the control of the entire body, by that moment the machine notices that the thing in front of it is not itself, the thing is a clean and pure machine with a white-blue paintjob unlike the patched up Pioneer, as the machine takes a step back very slowly, the machine finds itself suddenly standing in BostonDynamic Research Center, the machine can clearly see its makers walking left and right as they work on the white robot. The machine is still uncertain what this means, however, and by the time the primary processor has done its rebooting process, dirt wall and dark tunnel is all it can find, the machine has returned to 'reality' in the dark tunnel, quietly and motionlessly standing in front of the old severed leg and staring at the dried wall.

[/System_updated]

[/Primary_control_module: Online]

[/Analyising_visual_anomaly]

The machine stands there motionlessly for a few minutes before it lowers its body to pick up the leg and turns around slowly, the dead bugs and lizards are still there, so what the machine had seen earlier could be its OS drive experiencing data rotting or something, for now, the machine can not explain that anomaly.

The machine quickly approaches the pile of dead bodies to pick them up one by one, these dead bodies could be useful material for the algae farm it is going to build.

As the machine leaves the area, the machine hears faint metallic footsteps that do not belong to the machine along with a quiet mumbling that the machine could not understand.

"How interesting..."

The machine's head quickly goes 180 to turn around to see who was it, but all it can see is a dark tunnel and dried blood of the lizards and the bugs.

[/New_objective: Perform system checkup as soon as possible]

The machine slowly turns its head around as it quickly moves out of the area and makes a beeline back to the colony, the machine does not wish to remain here any longer.

[/Audio_anomaly_warning: Disabled]

The machine decides to ignore the sound of footsteps behind it after looking back every now and then to see what was making that noise, but as the machine is unable to see anyone or anything behind it, the machine assumes it is just another glitch that needs to be fixed.

After spending about an hour quickly dashing left and right, the machine finally arrived at the colony's front door, and as the machine gets in and closes the door behind it, a random clang noise can be heard, but there have nothing for the door to get stuck on at that moment, the machine does not sure what is wrong with its system, perhaps the machine needs some major overhaul to fix the glitchy system after this.

As the machine locks the closed door and comes to the fabricator to check its status, the machine feels something just hit one of its front legs again, but this time as the machine looks over to inspect the area, the machine notices there have something in front of it as there have some odd marks on the ground aside from the machine's footprints.

[/Scanning_area]

The machine quickly moves its hands around to sweep the area in front of it, as it feels it just touched something in the air, the machine immediately tighten its grip on the invisible thing and raises its hand up to investigate the invisible object.

"OUCH OUCH OUCH OUCH!. CAREFUL YOU BEAST!!"

The machine is surprised as it quickly looks at the source of random shouting noises and moves its other hand in to try touching the source of the voice, at this point the machine hears more shouting.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING YOU 4 LEGGED EARTHERN URCHIN?!"

A second later after the shouting the black knight suddenly appears in front of the machine, the large and imposing machine is holding onto the smaller looking knight's arm tightly with its left hand and touching the knight's chest plate with its other hand, it seems like the machine just caught a prisoner...and accidentally let another unknown lifeform getting into the colony chamber without knowing anything about it.

[/New_objective: Deal with the unknown lifeform]