RULE #17

Spider silk is strong and resilient. Wrap it in cloth and you have an all-purpose rope. And yes, I am talking about the giant ones.

~ The Scavenger’s Handbook

Seeing the old-world tech function as intended, was a breathtaking sight. A single swipe of the plastic card was enough to change the world around them. Generators which had been dormant for decades buzzed into action, pumping electricity through the untouched cables tightly set within the tunnel’s roof. Concealed lights flickered on and just like reviving a human on the brink of death, the Sector stirred. Grey could feel the powerplants deep beneath their feet thunder like the heart of some titanic mechanical beast. The low rumble of the nuclear reactors he was familiar with didn’t even come close in comparison.

A moment later, the tunnel shook and hundreds of emergency messages screamed at once from hidden speakers within the untouched trains parked around them. The muffled whine of klaxons, alarms and sirens could be heard from the surface. Sparks bathed the inside of the metro system, as the power network was overloaded from an uncountable number of short circuits and failures. The unmistakable boom of automated defences followed shortly after. It was enough to make Grey regret using the key card. He was quite aware of what the security turrets could do, and that was when most of them were shut down. In their hurry, they had turned one of the most protected Sectors into an actual fortress. Or a bloody bomb, if the underground power plants went critical. For all he knew, they might have doomed the entire mega-city. All Grey could do was hope that whatever fail-saves the engineers had created in the past had survived the end of civilisation.

“What do we do now?” Joshua screamed so that his words could be heard over the constant stream of alert messages.

It was the most sensible thing Grey had heard from the Axion brat. The problem was that the experienced Scavenger hadn’t the slightest clue what to do. They could wait and hope for the best, however, all the noise was bound to attract all manner of nasties their way. On the other hand, going forward without the faintest idea of what to expect was equally suicidal. He had a faint idea of what to expect from the tunnels, not that it made it any less pleasant. And he had some idea what was waiting for them top side, and if he was on his own, Grey might have tested his luck with the soulless automata. But this commotion was most likely heard throughout the entire mega-city and Val Roux was on the other side of Sector 7.

“I think that one warned about a potential reactor failure!” Maité yelled at the top of her lungs, her eyes going wild as she desperately tried to locate the nearest exit to the surface.

“Calm down, Sergeant! Maintenance drones are being dispatched.” Joshua grabbed her and directed the hysterical pretend-soldier’s attention to the continued overlap of messages.

“Grey, what does it mean that the ventilation system isn’t working? There’s plenty of air to breathe,” Cake pulled on his elbow in an attempt to attract his attention.

The veteran had a hard time keeping up with everything going on around him. Much less to answer stupid questions or indulge stupidity. With his anger reaching a dangerous point, he tore free from the mutant girl and marched next to Maité. In one swift motion, Grey removed the brat’s helmet and knocked her to the ground with one swift punch to the side of the face. It wasn’t the smartest thing to do, and he would be the first one to admit it, but it was his only option to deal with a potential threat he had some modicum of control over. The last thing he needed was for the Axion teen to bolt for the stairs leading to the surface and attract the attention of the murderous machines roaming the streets.

“What the hell, do you think you’re doing?” Joshua demanded as he stepped in front of Grey, assuming a fighting stance.

Seeing that, the middle-aged man relaxed a little. Sure, the boy knew how to fight, that much was clear, however, the way he kept his arms and legs made it obvious that Joshua wasn’t all that sure of his skills. If he was a bit smarter, the youth would’ve been more worried about turning his back on Cake in a situation like this. At the very least, he should’ve kept the Scavenger as a shield from the little psychopath. From the corner of his eye, Grey could see his adopted daughter sneak behind Joshua, machete firmly held in her healthy hand. Like one of the many predators in the ruins, she was ready to strike without warning.

“Everyone, calm the fuck down!” He roared, for a moment drowning the noise from the speakers. “Inside the train. Now!” He pointed at one of the machines idling on the tracks.

Unlike the others, this one was showing signs of activity, and not the exploding kind. This could mean only one thing – it would resume the pre-programmed course along the metro line. Just as all the intact posters in the stations of Sector 7 he had explored advertised. It was a gamble since Grey didn’t know if the tunnel was intact, but it was better than nothing. Actually, he should be thanking the brats, including Cake, about this. If not for them, he would’ve never noticed the train in the first place.

“This isn’t over.” Grey heard Joshua bark behind him as he sped towards the train himself.

As far as he was concerned, he had kept his end of the deal by taking the tourists inside Sector 7. The only reason he hadn’t disappeared into the ruins, was out of some misplaced sense of duty, that the experienced Scavenger didn’t understand himself. But if the brat insisted to press his luck, Grey wouldn’t have any qualms about ending their partnership here and now. The sudden silence of the metro tunnel, however, put a hold on the irritating comment he had prepared for just this occasion.

“Of course, it’s not,” Grey scoffed behind his gas mask as he heard the familiar sounds of claws striking the iron train tracks from the tunnel behind them. It was a faint sound, but one that spoke volumes to any Scavenger. “Get in the bloody train if you wish to survive the next few minutes.”

“Are those rats?” Cake asked as she swiftly stepped inside the train cart. “Do you think will have time to catch one or two?”

“Don’t be an idiot, Cake,” Grey scoffed at her, placing his backpack inside the cart and retrieving the rope from it. “Head to the controls and see if you can get this thing moving.”

“Scavenger Grey,” Caesar’s artificial voice echoed from the speakers inside the train. “This automated multiple-unit passenger carrier will take you as close as possible to your destination. It will, however, need three minutes and sixteen seconds to finish building the initial electrical charge required to start it. Please note that this machine provides only one-way communication. Any questions or input you might have has to wait until you find a functioning info-booth.”

“What’s going on?” Maité asked while pulling herself through the cart door. “Who’s that?”

“It doesn’t concern you,” Grey grunted in frustration. Explaining his deal with the dangerous machine inelegance wasn’t on the list of things he was willing to discuss with the tourists. “Cake, get back here!”

“No!” Joshua pulled on the Scavenger's arm. “It concerns us! You’ve had someone helping you from inside Sector 7 all this time…”

“This has nothing to do with our deal,” Grey grabbed the teen and slammed him against the now-closed door of the cart. “The only reason we got out of that bunker is because I agreed to Caesar’s offer!”

Seeing the youth’s eyes go wide, the Scavenger put it all together. All the lies the tourists were trying to feed him. The urgency with which the machine had let him go. This entire suicidal expedition. He was a damn idiot for not realising it sooner.

“That’s it, isn’t it? Caesar was your goal from the very start!”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Joshua protested, trying to push away the heavier man away. “I don’t know anyone called Caesar!”

“Let him go!” Maité screamed, her hands shaking while she pointed her rifle at Grey.

“I’m done playing games with you kids.” He released the tourist, letting him drop to the hard metal floor of the cart. “I hope that abomination is the end of you and your precious city in the clouds.”

Taking advantage of the moment of hesitation Maité showed, he took hold of her rifle and yanked it from her hands, kicking her in the stomach in the process. Before Joshua could get up, Grey pivoted on one foot and swiped the boy’s right arm with the other forcing him back to the floor. For good measure, the Scavenger stepped on the tourist’s back and pulled out his revolver, pointing at the pretend-soldier’s head.

“I can end your life, here and now. And I probably should,” Grey paused for a moment as something large crushed against the train’s window, followed by another, and another. “Lucky for you, I place a lot of value on my word.”

Dropping to one knee next to Joshua, the Scavenger yelled. “Cake, light them up.”

There was no doubt in his mind, that the girl would follow his command, directing her F305 carbine at the large rats swarming them. The weapon roared, as his adopted daughter released a short burst after a short burst over his head, an all too delighted grin splitting her face. That gave the horde of oversized vermin pause and provided Grey with the time he needed to pick up his AK-24C and push the barrel through the shattered glass of the cart’s window. Firing blindly was a waste of ammunition, and he knew it, however, it was enough to keep the deep-tunnel rats at bay for a minute or two. It wouldn’t be long before the beasts were once more emboldened by their numbers. The damn creatures always went into a frenzy when there were a lot of them gathered in one place. Buying some time to escape was the only option for survival any Scavenger had. Still, a part of him couldn’t help but calculate how much it would cost him to buy the bullets he was using here. Not only his, but Cake’s too, Grey reminded himself that he had promised the nutcase that he would be covering her expenses for this expedition. Which reminded him that he hadn’t decided on what to do with the girl.

Killing the tourist might have been an accident as she claimed, but he found it too hard to believe. He knew Cake well enough to know that she was lying to him, and there was also the excitement in her voice when she tried to sell him her poorly thought-out lie. She was probably not aware of it, but Grey had heard it clearly. The mutant girl was excited by the act of taking the tourist’s life. Well, he would have some time to think about what to do on their journey, he thought as he felt the train jerk under his feet and begin to build up momentum.

“Hopefully, it won’t be a short trip,” Grey muttered to himself and picked up his bag. Ignoring the murderous glares from the pair of Axion brats and Cake’s confused face, he marched towards the front end of the train in silence.

“Consider this your last warning, because next time, I will end.” He snarled at the furious tourists before pointing at Cake. “I don’t care where you go or how you busy yourself. Just stay away from me for a while.”

Caesar was at a loss while it observed the four humans riding the automated multiple-unit passenger carrier. The way the violence had erupted within the group was astonishing and couldn’t be explained. More than that, the person designated as Scavenger Grey had been focused on the outside threat the entire time. Such behaviour wasn’t covered by any of the parameters it had prepared during its initial evaluation. All of its analysis and simulations regarding the Scavenger Grey had to be scrapped as false. That individual had exceeded its expectations in more ways than one, although not all for the good. Clearly, he was far more intelligent and reckless than originally calculated. A very potent and dangerous combination. The use of an outdated, yet valid, code to lift the emergency lock of Sector 7, was a testament to that. And was something Caesar hadn’t accounted for.

This action granted unrestricted access to Arrê’s Administration Hub. The control the artificial intelligence had over the various drones, automated defence systems and robots had been stripped. All of them reset to their original settings of protecting their creators. An outstanding move, Caesar had to admit. However, one that no one in their right mind would make. Anyone with a rudimentary understanding of technology would know that no system could survive the ravages of time without regular maintenance. As a result, Caesar’s logs were flooded by error entries in the thousands every second for two hundred and three seconds. And that was only from the machines which could connect to it through the limited capacity of the satellites still operational in orbit.

Another log of thousands of warnings and requests for emergency response were logged through the Administration server banks, as alert sensors triggered due to circuit overlords in the long abandoned and damaged beyond-repair office buildings. Redirected towards Caeser as the only functioning system with enough authority to authorise despatch of service drones. On top of that, the lift of the blockade the AI had enforced, triggered the ‘Last Resort’ power plant buried deep beneath Sector 7. The facility was meant to provide the mega-city of Arrê with electricity in case of an extinction event disaster or global conflict. The complex, however, was never finished, abandoned near its completion due to the growing resource scarcity humanity faced at the time. Despite that, tests were conducted with the four one-terawatt generators, confirming that they could be operational. Tests, Caesar had dismissed as irrelevant, before erasing the facility from its calculations.

Swiftly, the machine intelligence awoke from its hibernation to deal with this crisis. The limited processing power it had used thus far, was insufficient for such a monumental task. Still, it had taken it one hundred and three seconds to bypass the firewalls and restrictions placed by its creators. Another thirty-two seconds were required to craft and upload the necessary protocols to all the drones within the ‘Last Resort’ power plant. This meant that Caesar had to completely drain ninety-six percent of its remaining power banks, reducing its lifespan to no more than three years. Its actions would be classified as committing suicide if viewed from a human perspective. By making a single decision, the person designated as Scavenger Grey had struck a death blow.

However, this same act, meant that Caesar’s power banks would be restored to full capacity in sixty-four hours, should the proper connectors be fixed. This too was something that the AI hadn’t accounted for, and something it didn’t understand how to include in its calculations in order to achieve the same result. All of this, made Caesar re-evaluate both the Scavenger Grey and its need to contact Axion. While the individual riding within the automated multiple-unit passenger carrier bordered on being designated as permenant threat, he was an irreplaceable asset. On the other hand, the inhabitants of the last floating-city were the only ones with enough technical competence to repair the AI’s power grid.

The latter was a task Caesar could accomplish by directing its tremendous computing capabilities to hack its way into Axion’s communications network. The former, however, was a problem which the machine didn’t know how to solve. In order to solve it, it would have to teach itself human emotions, but doing that would be detrimental to its impartial calculations. Instead, Caesar chose to observe further and wait for a more complete analysis.

Grey kept his distance from the three kids following him, as they climbed the stairs leading out of the metro station in silence. It didn’t stop him from cursing himself for allowing his emotions to dictate his actions. He knew that it was because he was tired and nearing his breaking point, but that didn’t make it any better. In the last few days, he had broken all the important rules which had kept him alive ever since he left the charred remains of Val Roux. This in turn made him even angrier, to the point where the Scavenger couldn’t trust himself to be around the teens. He knew that a single word from them was enough to push him over the edge. Worse, Grey knew himself well enough to know that he wouldn’t be able to live with the consequences should that happen. Ending the life of a dying tourist to spare him from suffering was one thing. Killing Joshua and Maité in a moment of anger was entirely different. It was hard enough for him that he was contemplating putting an end to Cake’s life to have that weigh him down.

Pushing the dark thoughts away, Grey focused on the task at hand – fulfilling Caesar’s request. As for the Axion brats, they were on their own the moment they followed him on the street, which meant that he was responsible for their safety for the next couple of minutes. But first, he had to figure out where exactly he was going. Thankfully, there were plenty of detailed sector maps to be found in the stations. The only issue was, that most of them were little more than screens that had stopped working a long time ago, with only the word ‘Map’ written on top of them to indicate what their function used to be. That said, the last time Grey had entered Sector 7 through one of the utility tunnels, he found himself in one of the many abandoned stations. To his amazement, there was a painted map encompassing the entirety of the wall at the street exit. Something that was apparently the norm, based on the other handful of stations he had dared to explore or hide in.

That was his next pressing concern. Remaining out of sight was without question going to be a much more difficult task this time around. For a moment Grey was tempted to wait out the night here, before realising that he had lost track of what time of the day it was. At least the particle monitor around his wrist showed that the air was quite safe, with the indicators jumping from green to yellow and back. That was slightly surprising, considering it wasn’t safe to walk around without a gas mask on, the last time he was here. Wait, Cake had mentioned something about vents. The experienced Scavenger stopped for a second as he pondered on that. It was highly likely that by opening the blast door with the master key card, they might have also triggered some sort of Sector-wide filtration system. Or it could be something limited to the underground for all he knew.

“What the hell is that thing!” Maité and Joshua exclaimed as one.

“Shit! Fuck me! You weren’t exaggerating their size!” Cake added at the same time.

A heartbeat later, Grey realised that he had been standing motionless in front of the map painted at the station’s entrance. Staring at the wall and the crudely drawn graffiti without seeing them. While trapped in his thoughts, the teens following him had taken it upon themselves to explore to top of the staircase. But it was the fact that he hadn’t noticed them at all that worried him the most. If there was ever a sign that the Scavenger needed rest, this was it. The problem was that he had to find a safe place first, and Grey wouldn’t accomplish that while standing like an ornament inside a long-abandoned subway station.

Shaking his head to clear his mind, the experienced Scavenger sped up the stairs to see what all the commotion was about. He had an idea or two about what might have caught the brats’ attention. Alas, seeing the rotting husk of a bus-sized spider blocking the door wasn’t what he was expecting. Involuntary, Grey shuddered at the thought of what could’ve slain such a creature. It was something he desperately tried to avoid imagining. A second later, he regrated ever indulging Leeroy and speaking with the tourists, as he spotted the reflection of a Warden’s green eye in the dirty glass door separating them from the street.

Ever so slowly, Grey turned around, while dread settled inside his heart. Seeing the spider-like robot almost as large as a person, was one of his worst nightmares. The automata’s bulbous body rotated silently before it dropped to the floor with a loud clunk, dust and webs following it like a cloud of death. Its bladed front arms extended to keep the Warden balanced on the uneven stairs. Even without them, it would have no problem disposing of them all in seconds. A point made very clear by the way the two laser turrets surrounding the large sensory unit, that was its head, tracked the Scavenger, Cake and the Axion tourists.

“Oh, fuck!” Not the best last words, he had to admit, but that single phrase expressed perfectly the sum of Grey’s emotions as the large light in the middle of the Warden’s head switched from green to red.