I thought getting to the area where they test that portable quantum tunneling device would be easy, but that was not the case. As it turned out after i left chill out room I stumbled upon a 5 person patrol at the first corridor junction. Fortunately they didn’t notice me. I knew I was disguised as one of them, but I didn’t want to tempt the fate, so I quickly scouted the area and hid myself in a ventilation shaft. It was really tight, I barely fit in.

undefined

*tap* *tap* *tap*

I heard the patrol getting closer.

“Theta squad got to secure the nanites outbreak and what did we get? Just another shitty patrolling duty! As if something would go this way. Hmpf.” Said one member of patrol.

“Shut up Dave! Did you forget that there are security cameras equipped with microphones all over the complex?” Barked the other one.

How could I forgot about cameras!? Now I’m really in a deep mess!

“Don’t worry, we all know that they won’t check these cameras, at least not until they check the ones with higher priority.” Said Dave.

I guess fortune favors me today. Let’s hope I won’t run out of luck before I get out of this mess.

“Yeah I know, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.” Said the second voice.

They’ve talked like this for about 5 minutes more before finally leaving my range of hearing. After I made sure that they’ve left this area I tried exiting the ventilation shaft. It took me great effort just to move by an inch, only to get stuck.

Damn it! Hal any ideas how to exit this shaft?

“Calculating... There are 621 options available.“ Hal answered.

Tell me about the quickest and the most silent one.

“Increase Ego integration to 20%” Said Hal.

Damn it I don’t like the idea of becoming less human, but I have to get to the lab as fast as I can. Hal do it.

“Initializing procedure.” I heard the Hal.

Increasing Ego integration

Again I felt the surge of knowledge entering my brain, but this time I also felt a tingle all over my body.

Ego integration at 15%

I could feel nanites replacing my bones, but it was not painful and with a new part of knowledge I understood that I was no longer a human, my brain was completely replaced by nanites. I no longer needed an organic body to survive.

I wonder if souls do exist is my soul still connected to this body or left it after my brain has been removed?

“Unknown” Surprisingly I heard the reply from Hal.

Hal is it possible for you to restore my lost memories?

“That is not possible, after brain has been assimilated all corrupted data has been deleted.” Answered Hal.

Then why I get the feeling that my memories are almost within my reach?

“Unknown” Said Hal.

Never mind, forget I asked.

“Acknowledged.” Hal replied.

Ego integration at 20%

Process complete

Ok. It’s time to get out of this place.

With the newly acquired wisdom my skill at manipulating nanites drastically improved. I no longer needed help of Hal with it. I made my newly formed mechanical bones slightly more flexible thus allowing me to easily exit the ventilation shaft.

I followed the guide through the labyrinth of corridors without any major problems on a way, but the problem showed up after I arrived at the entrance to the testing area.

“Stop right there! We’ve detected that your keycard does not permit you to enter this area.” Someone has asked a question

I turned around only to see an empty corridor. At first I was a little confused, but soon I realized that the voice came from a speaker mounted inside the camera. I tried opening the doors, but as I suspected the keycard was not working on these.

Hal can you open these doors?

“Hacking...” Said Hal.

“Uhm, I got separated from my team after we were attacked by the target. It attacked us by a surprise. I lost my consciousness and when I woke up I was alone and without communicator” I said to the man behind the camera.

“Which squad do you belong to?” The voice asked me.

“Theta squad” I answered.

“State your security code, so we can ascertain your identity.” I heard the reply.

“Access Granted.” Hal informed me.

“Listen carefully, my security code is: I’m going to escape you anyway!” I shouted and then rushed through the doors.

The testing area I entered was enormous. It was a big white square room with a surface area at least 250m2, but it was far from empty, there were all different kind of machines everywhere in this chamber, with a some sort of an open cylinder in the middle. Each machine was connected to the cylinder with some sort of cable, the sheer amount of cables formed a black net on the floor. There was something like a control panel in front of the cylinder.

I don’t know why, but I expected a some sort of black and white gun which shoots portals instead of this machinery. Anyway let's see if I can activate this thing with that control panel.

“Target has been located! All available teams must head to zone B34 as soon as possible!” I heard the camera man voice while I was walking towards the panel.

Hall disable the door control to slow them down and hack this terminal so we can activate this machine.

“Removing the door control systems… Hacking...” Said Hal.

While Hal was hacking the panel I was searching the room for some useful items. After 7 minutes Hal finally exclaimed.

“Access granted. Downloading data... Complementing the database... Accessing the internet… Downloading data… Connection terminated… Access denied Connection terminated.”

Hal what the heck? How we are going to activate this thing now?

“Alternative is available. Step into the cylinder we will hack it directly.” Answered Hal.

I followed the Hal advice and stepped into the cylinder.

“Damn it! The doors are locked.” I heard the muffled voice from behind the doors.

Hal we have to hurry. They are already here!

“Assuming control.” Said Hal.

I felt as if something started crawling on my feet and when I looked down I noticed silver threads coming out of my feet, which then proceeded to entwine the cylinder.

“Just shoot them! God damn it! You’ve got a plasma launcher in your hands!” I heard another voice.

“Power up initialized… Entering the coordinates… Initializing transport procedure...” After hal informed the whole machinery started to emit the buzzing sound.

*boom* *smack*

I heard an explosion followed by doors crashing into the generator.

Oh shit! Please don’t die. Please don’t die.

Unfortunately the generator didn’t listen to me, after few seconds it made a similar sound to cough and stopped working.

“Manual power input initialized.” Said Hal.

“Whew, I forgot that you can power it up.”

I felt relieved, but then I noticed that the energy bar in my field of vision started dropping really fast, around 10% per second.

“Destroy the equipment, we can’t let it escape!” Someone has shouted as the MTF entered the testing area.

They started shooting at everything, but then one of them has noticed me, aimed at me and shot.

“Power up complete. Commencing Transportation.” Said Hal as the plasma ball was heading towards me.

“Arghh...” I felt a searing pain in my left arm, before being enveloped by darkness.

Am I dead? Did the transportation fail?

“Negative, you are alive. You’ve been transported, but we don’t know the exact location. The damage to the machinery might have influenced the machine.” Answered Hal.

Then why I can’t feel any of my senses?

“We are in the process of entering sleep mode.” Answered Hal.

I was about to ask why, but then a strange drowsiness attacked me and before I’ve fell asleep I had only managed to notice energy bar value which was at 0.05%.