Breachers

Breachers – Path of Steel

4

I

Untethered

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[Booting up...]

[System diagnostics in progress...]

[WARNING: Critical damage detected...]

[Component calibration... Partial failure...]

[Loading subsystems... Impaired functionality...]

[Initialization incomplete]

[ERROR: Malfunction in primary circuits...]

[WARNING: Structural integrity compromised...]

[ERROR: Communication with core systems lost...]

[ERROR: Power supply is not detected...]

[ERROR: Motor control exceeds standard parameters...]

[WARNING: Emergency shutdown failed...]

[EMERGENCY REBOOT INITIATED...]

[System activation: 100%]

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Marcus’s consciousness flickered back to life, his body jerking as an unfamiliar surge of energy coursed through him. Memories of excruciating pain and scorching heat flooded his mind, accompanied by the lingering aftertaste of blood. He recalled the sensation of a powerful force colliding with the right side of his body before it shattered and started to melt into his flesh. Chaotic and fragmented memories swirled in his mind, images of a warm liquid cascading over him and an unrelenting pressure bearing down upon him. Then, as suddenly as they had come, the memories vanished, leaving him in a void devoid of any sensation—no pain, no scent, no touch, not even the reassuring rhythmic throb of his own heartbeat

His vision gradually flickered back, but in a peculiar manner, as if someone had switched it on, rather than him simply opening his eyes. The instant he caught sight of the Heads-Up Display, a startling realization struck him—he was still connected with the robot and was perceiving the world through its mechanical lens. A growing unease and terror gripped him as he comprehended the absence of his own physical sensations, replaced by the cold embrace of the metal shell encasing him. ‘What’s going on?’ he wondered, his thoughts a storm of confusion and fear. ‘What the hell happened to my body?’

With his vision restored, he tilted his head back, staring past the edges of the broken building and collapsed roof around him. Beyond it, he saw the vast expanse of the night sky, awash in an eerie blue hue, as if dyed. ‘Why is it nighttime? How long was I out?’ Thoughts raced through his mind in a panic as he barely registered the peculiar blue hue to the night sky. He could still hear the mixture of further destruction around him; structures breaking apart, things on fire, and anguished cries filling the air. He tried to move, but his body didn’t respond right, as if trapped by something heavy, yet he couldn’t actually feel the pressure.

Confusion gripped him as he struggled to orient himself. ‘What the hell happened here... to me?’ he pondered, his thoughts battling against the disorienting haze. ‘Were those bombs that hit us? It looked more like meteors,’ he thought as he recalled hearing about meteors on the radio before. While doing so he shifted his gaze to the left, where Felix’s form lay motionless, cloaked in layers of dust. Worry clenched Marcus’s soul at seeing his friend like that until a sense of relief washed over him as he observed the gentle rise and fall of his friend’s chest, showing that he was still clinging to life. ‘Thank god... he's breathing... he’s alive.’

The relief was short-lived as Marcus recalled the last minutes with his friends. ‘What about Oscar?’ Memories of the meteoric onslaught flashed through his mind. He recalled how an impact had slammed through Oscar and into his robotic frame, afterwards causing his blackout. He turned his head, hearing the pistons and motors in his frame as he scanned left and right in search of his friend, only to discover Oscar’s broken form atop him, buried under a heap of rubble, a large hole visible in the center of his chest. ‘No! Oscar!’ His friend was barely recognizable, save for a few strands of unscathed blonde hair. Marcus’s mind nearly broke as he gave in to the urge to scream and howl, yet no sound escaped his steel frame. His heartache and grief reverberated within, unable to give voice to it, inflicting wounds that cut him to his core.

‘Oscar… it can't end like this, not like this,’ Marcus thought as he fought to liberate his arm, the sound of shifting rubble echoing as it slid off his steel and plastic limb. With great effort, he reached out and embraced what remained of his friend, holding onto Oscar’s lifeless form. Struggling to free his other arm and legs proved futile—they remained trapped, refusing to budge underneath the weight of all the debris. ‘NO!’ Defeat tightened its grip around his heart, his body now also a prisoner beneath the emotional weight of his friend's lifeless form. He tore his gaze from the wreckage that once was Oscar, keeping it pointed at the blue night sky, as if attempting to shield his very essence from the nightmarish reality he held in his arm. Time slipped away from him, its passing unnoticed amidst the cacophony of screams and impending danger. Seconds stretched into minutes as Marcus remained motionless, his mind numb and detached.

Gradually, a sense of weakness overcame him, as if something essential was slipping away from him. He couldn’t quite grasp what it was. It resembled fatigue, but it wasn’t quite the same. Still, Marcus didn’t mind the feeling. He wanted to give into it, to stop seeing things and detach himself from the outside world that threatened to overwhelm him, but the mechanical lens refused to comply. It didn’t have the ability to close. Fate, it seemed, wanted to force Marcus to bear witness. After what felt like eons, a gnawing certainty slowly rooted itself within him—his body was out there. Intact or in a similar condition to Oscar’s, but it was out there, somewhere. ‘How the hell am I still even connected to this thing?’ he pondered, skeptical that the cable connecting him to his body had long been severed or damaged. ‘And how come it works without power?’

A disturbing sound reached Marcus’s ears. It sounded like flesh being torn apart, accompanied by a deep growl. He instinctively shifted his gaze downward, only to find a strange creature ripping off bits of what remained of Oscar. In an instant, Marcus’s clouded mind snapped back into focus, a clear objective that even his broken mind could grasp; Protect your friend! ‘Get off him!’ he shouted in his own mind, forcefully colliding his steel limb into the creature’s chest, propelling it quite a distance until it crashed into a nearby pile of rubble with enough force to shift bits of concrete to the side.

As the creature swiftly regained its footing, Marcus’s steel hand made an instinctual fist out of anger and sheer terror. He felt captivated and repulsed by the creature’s unearthly appearance. Its features were a haunting blend of feline and human, devoid of fur but exuding an unsettling resemblance to both. Standing at the height of a child and partially covered in a sickly white fur, it emanated a predatorial aura. The creature’s hiss sliced through the air, a chilling sound that reverberated within Marcus’s metal frame.

Marcus watched the creature’s mouth, transfixed by the sight in front of him. Rows of sharp bloody teeth glistened malevolently while hinting at its savage nature. Each tooth seemed to be designed for one purpose alone—tearing flesh. ‘What the hell is that thing?’ Marcus thought, mentally feeling the need to tremble in fear, but his steel frame wasn’t cooperating. Moments later, the creature scurried away after another hiss, its movements incredibly quick. In its hasty retreat, something peculiar caught Marcus’s attention—a protrusion on the back of its skull emitting a dim glow.

As the creature vanished from sight, Marcus’s mind raced, consumed by uncertainty. ‘First meteors… now this? It looked like a monster.’ His gaze shifted towards the spot where he had thrown the creature into. With bits of debris now shifted, he could now make out several lifeless bodies buried beneath the rubble, including the broken remnants of the staff members he had previously interacted with. Their forms were twisted and stained with blood, yet their blank expressions concealed the pain they had endured at the end of their lives.

Amidst the grim scene, Marcus noticed another body caked in dust and blood. A shattered helmet partially obscured the face, but enough of it had been smashed apart to reveal an expressionless blue eye staring into nothingness. Dread tightened its grip on Marcus’s being, or what remained of it that was now trapped in this metal shell. His own body lay before him, buried underneath rubble and marred by a blackish material that appeared to have burned or melted into parts of his body along the chest, arm, and the top right side of his face. ‘Am I... dead?’ Marcus thought, fear gripping him as he noticed the black marks on his head.

Marcus’s eyes locked onto his motionless body, his sanity shattering under the weight of the brutal truth. He realized that he was staring at his own corpse, cursed to witness it all from the confines of his mechanical prison until that too died. A desperate urge to weep and wail surged within him, but the unyielding metal frame merely quivered—a hollow echo of the searing pain he experienced. Marcus felt his strength ebb away, drained by the unnatural tether linking him to the machine. ‘I’m going to die like this... I’m going to just fade away without even being able to feel my death.’

A short distance away from him, among the shattered debris, a faint scraping noise reached him, hinting at movement. In the last seconds he still had left in this world, he clutched the remains of his deceased friend, determined to make his last moments have some sort of meaning. ‘Find out what I’m born to do,’ he thought, recalling his father’s words as he gripped Oscar tightly, determined to have his last moment on Earth be one of him actually being a good friend. He’d go out protecting the memory of Oscar from the creature that had come back to feast. And as his thoughts dissolved into nothingness, his last glimpse revealed a figure tripping over his metal form before slowly stumbling towards the buried corpse pile that contained his actual remains.

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Copyright: OsiriumWrites