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Job 01: B.U.Ds and Buddies

Master Con: Pewter

-Harrison Ciccarelli

Job 01: BUDs and Buddies

I sifted through the severance package and sighed. A box of half-century old 5555 chips and a 20% off coupon for Rum-junction. ‘The hell’s the point of being a pen-tester if they’re gonna fire you for humiliating them? The least they could do is give me a proper paycheque for tearing through their multi-million-dollar security system. Hell, I even wrote a full report and recommendations on how to fill the cracks! Ungrateful grognards… Huh… I wonder if they’ve changed the cyphers yet? I turned to my B.U.Ddy: “Yo, Crashlogue, still got those cyphers?” Standing behind me as I ate my Ramen at the roadside stall, my Bi-neural Utility Droid: model Dynamic, spun his head around and nodded affirmatively. “Seein as they threw out our NDA with my paycheque, why don’t we have ourselves a little fire sale. Don’t bother with high prices. Sell’em off for a grand a pop. They should be gone by the time the listing’s even completed.”

“Take your usual commission and meet me back here in an hour.”

<Affirmative. Robo-Rec center around the block. Heading in for a cleanup and recharge.>

“Take it easy Buddy, see ya later.”

I waved him off dismissively as I turned back to my pork noodles. I tapped the counter. “Oi, Oh-jee-san. Nii-tsu Beeruu, Koo-da sai.” Two ice cold Asa-bi ryes were slid over. I grabbed one and was just about to crack it open when the hand of some joker reached out for my second beer.

I grabbed the bastard’s wrist and squeezed the color out of it. “Look here bud- if you wanna get a fat lip, wait till im done my--- !” I stared at the guys face and struggled to recall where I’d seen it before. He had a distinctive Duck-tail pompadour that practically had its own mac address. He was slim and wore a simple black suit with a thin yellow tie.

“Wait a sec… Is that you Li--- ” before I could speak out his name, he cut me off with grandeur.

“Long time no see ‘Tronic, you certainly bulked out since high school.”

“And you haven’t changed a bit. What do you go by these days? Still use that silly sudonum?”

He sighed exasperatedly.

“You tellin’ me you haven’t heard of me and my exploits? The phantom Cypher! The Byte-eater! The master con man, Pewter L. Cyper!”

I recalled an article I had read a few days earlier regarding a hardware robbery in a high-end conglomerate. “Wait… The Bithmask job, that was you?”

“Nearly cost my life, but Im glad to see so many firms have begun using full suite Combat-BUDs for physical security. Makes it a real breeze to just waltz in the front door.” He tossed around a blood-crusted bolt in his hand. A relic from his narrow escape.

“Huh, you’re tellin’ me! Last five places I worked gave me the sac ‘cause I told ‘em to put a Man for every 10 bots. Dumb bastards‘ll get theirs someday…”

“Which day?” Pewter asked coy-ly with a raised brow.

I paused a moment… I knew that look in his eye. The kind of look we used to get before getting suspended for ‘cyber negligence’. Pewter must have also recalled our schoolday plots because he immediately cut me off before I could protest our history. “Hey, that one time was totally on Sheffer! He was supposed to keep watch, he threw us under the bus just as the principal was about to walk on stage!”

I rolled my eyes and slurped up some more noodles. “And that time Ellinora caught you with your--” He put his hands up before I could embarrass him. “Hey now! I told you a hundred times, that I was pushed from behind and the front of my shirt got caught in the mechanism! Who gives a care about that lying harlot anyways. You shouldn’t trust indecent women like that: It can be hazardous to your health! To display his point he rolled down his collar to reveal a small but prominent bite-shaped scar on his clavicle.

I drained my Asa-bi’s and ordered two more. I made sure to put both hands on them before ole slick-pocket could take em. “Alright, slim. As nice as its been catching up. I can tell you aint here to find a friend… Im gonna guess you need a wingman for whatever hair brained scheme you’ve got brewing and Im the poor sap you came to first…”

Pewter looked at his feet embarrassedly and poked his fingers together… “Well… the first to hear me out. And hey! I didn’t come to you last because you were the last one I thought of: I know how you like wearing that grey-hat of yours. But if you really think about it--”

“DON’T!” I huffed in protest: well aware of the fallacy he was about to invoke.

“Is there really a difference between Pen-testing and a B’n’E? Other than that, one actually pays out…”

I cracked open both beers and downed them with gusto. I slapped some cash on the table and stood to look Pewter eye to eye. I bore into his very soul. My forehead was flush with the tip of his pompadour and I could see the truth in his eyes. He wasn’t a bad guy by any means. What he really needed was someone to keep him honest… I felt ill as I realized my place in all this.

“You’ve got 10 minutes. Lets hear it.”

Pewter perked up, as if he had been expecting this outcome: “Perfect! We’ll be there in five.”

---

I shakily climbed out of Pewter’s Lancer. Come to think of it, I don’t ever remember him getting his license…

“Its incredible you haven’t died driving like that!”

Shrugging it off he merely chuckled: “Hey, we made it across town in record speed! We would have been even faster if that farmers market hadn’t been there.” I sighed, wiping chuck-steaks and produce from the trunk. I pulled a ripe pear from between the spoiler, wiped it on my shirt and bit into it as I studied my surroundings. We were parked across the street from a large mansion at the edge of town. There were a few other extravagant buildings beside it but nary a soul around. The front yard was surrounded by twenty-foot electric fences. Infrared, ultraviolet, and radio wave radars posted to create full circle/full spectrum vison. I opened my datapad and set a few commands. The screen flickered to life and began probing the local networks. I looked around and saw two access points disguised as streetlamps. Obviously trojans. Among the list of accesspoints I began crossing off the suspected hunneypots.

“Here. Got it. Unsecured Gynoid. Penetrating now.”

Pewter gave me a look with a raised eyebrow. “Phrasing.”

I continued my deadpan stare at him and chewed on the pear as the exploit did its work. I skimmed the lines of code as they whizzed by, looking for patterns and vulnerabilities. Half the code was in Cantonese and the rest was using a charset I didn’t even know anyone used anymore. I skimmed the patterns and found what I was looking for… the “active hours” table… “Next updates in 20mins. I’ll prepare the payload. As long as we move on it within the next week we should have access.”

Pewter smirked: “I knew I could count on you. But, we’re not coming back later… ” Before I could protest, he had already opened the trunk and thrown a jumpsuit at my head. I pulled it off and read the back: “Love Bytes, Bot repair”.

Hey hey, now, I said I would listen, I didn’t plan to do this today! I don’t even have my BUDdy with me? Even if I hit the GREP key, it’d still take him time to run across town.

I looked over to Pewter, who was holding a small black fob whose singular red light was pulsing slowly. “Well… he should be here by the time I prep the rest of the gear.”

I reached into my pocket and noticed my GREP remote missing. From my waistband I drew my coil-pistol and aimed it at my friend. “Let me make one thing very clear Lisof James Pewter, you ever flitch me again and I’ll make sure you never steal from (I aimed at his raised hands) or love (I aimed at his jewels) anyone ever again. I make myself clear?”

Undaunted, but understanding the threat Pewter, dropped the fob and kept his arms outstretched. “I understand my friend. Im sorry for being forward but to tell you the truth, the window for grabbing our prize is very short. This protype goes into production tomorrow, and Im taking back whats mine. With interest!”

I kept my gun trained on him contemplating why I let myself get swindled into working with this joker yet again. He tried to assuage me: “I swear on my mum’s grave, I never have or will steal from a friend…. other than this one time. But I promise you, the work will be worth it and the payout immeasurable! You’ll never have to work for those sorry sods again! I’ll even help you get back at them if you’d like?”

I weighed my options carefully. I holstered my weapon. “I don’t care who ye swear to. But I’ll keep you to yer word. Or else!”

The con-man wiped sweat from his brow and sighed in relief. “I may be many things, but one thing Im not, is a liar. If I say I’ll do something. You can trust it. Just like how you can trust that this job is going to go off without a hitch. I get my prototype back and you get a nice payout. It’s a win-win! If you wanna be done with me after that, youre free to walk away; I promise never to bother you again…”

I grabbed his skinny arm and made him shake on it. “I’ll keep ye to that. Damn well believe it!”

Suddenly at the end of the street, one of the cities booth-shaped jetty-tubes rang with the usual “incoming” bell. A moment later, the rounded door swung open and Crashlouge was jettisoned out onto the street. He landed with a heavy clunk on two feet and turned to see me and Pewter standing by the car.

My 4ft tall steel-welded partner in proliferation strode forward with heavy steps towards Pewter.

I weakly protested and lazily drew out my words. “Hey Crash, buddy, that stranger was the one who caused the GREP alert. But, you probably-- shouldn’t--” *BONK*

Crash gave Pewter a fat lip before I gave the halt command. I shrugged, showing him that I could do nothing to halt owed hubris. While the Con-man massaged his jaw and ego, I brought my BUDdy up to speed on the situation.

I nodded in agreement.

“The scruples of our employer aside: give me a technical analysis of the mansion.”

Crashlouge processed the request and I sent him what I knew via the datapad.

“See Alak? Even your bot agrees with me.” The Con man threw a magnet sticker like a discus to Crash. “Yo Steel-wheel, slap this mag-sticker on your back. We’re here to fix a Gynoid that’s about to have a bad time.” Crashlouge looked over to me, his oculators asking for permission to hit Pewter again. I waved him off and replied curtly “If the job goes south, you’re more than welcome to; In the meantime, lets get to work BUDdy.”

---

Once the stage was set, we hid the car around the block and walked up to the gate in uniform. I furiously typed commands into my datapad, queueing exploits and editing taskschedules. I made sure to intercept the auto-mod request for a repair team to arrive, and was just finishing entering our fake credentials into our shell company when the gate buzzed us. A robotic voice designed for protocol and service came over the speak next to the door. Its metallic visage taking up the limited display.

Pewter ran a hand through his pompadour and changed his mien on the spot, suddenly it sounded like he had worked as a chain-smoking plumber for twenty years: “Yeah, Uh, so’s you wanna be the one to tell yuh boss that the reason his sex-box broke his prick is that his doorman was incapable of vetting the gate? Look, if you don’t want us, we’re gone; plenty of other nuts to tighten, if you know whatdd’aye mean.”

Crashlouge and I stood with a 6ft long service bay box over our shoulders, a hand on my coilgun, just in case… Pewter grabbed his tool-bag and started to walk away like he meant it. A moment the later from the doorbell speaker: <Identity confirmed: Joe Shmuck and Jimmy Fluach of Love Bytes Robot repair. Wear these badges at all times or be in violation of trespassing ordinance 24F-2A079… >

While the Bot droned on, Pewter did a heel turn and grabbed our badges from the drop slot before pushing through double ironwrough gates. I passed Crash my weapon, in case it got flagged. Knowing we were under surveillance we kept our heads down and mouths shut as we entered through the ornate and heavy wooden front doors. Mag-electron security lock, with a local redundance backup bpu. We’d have an easier time blowing the door than opening it should we need a quick exit. The Butler, a seemingly standard BUDdy unit with a tailcoat paintjob escorted us into the entry hall where several serve-bots roamed the balcony above performing domestic tasks. Without a cooperator, each of the BPU’s in those things must be slaved to a central dispatch controller. If we found it, we could own the building in minutes.

The butler stepped noiselessly as Crash and I carried the repair bay through the halls. We were led past the lobby and towards the upstairs through the rear of the house in the servant’s quarters. It was in the staff kitchen that we saw the first human. And jeez, what a knockout she was.

Gorgeous alabaster skin squeezed into a tight secretary’s dress, her #FF0000-red hair tied into a tight bun, with a pair of chopsticks holding it together. She slowly turned as my gaze lingered a little too long. Her beautiful face turned to me seductively, but abruptly twisted into grimace as soon as she locked eyes with Pewter.

“Jeeves! What are these imbecile’s doing here? The master clearly stated that during these hours he wants absolute privacy!” The beautiful woman pointed a ballpoint pen accusatorily at Pewter and I, her eyes shooting daggers directly into Pewters soul.

<Miss Lee: These repair men are here to service one of the masters… relief droid. Unless of course, you know these two suspicious cretins personally?> The butler stopped his march and began to press the secretary.

Pewter flipped his cap down and tried to placate our accusers: “Im sorry miss, you must be mistaking me with another handsome man you’ve dated. I apologize for the confusion.” Pewter tried to shoulder past Jeevs but was stopped by a firm metallic grip.

The butler snapped the digits on his other hand and the walls of the staff kitchen swiveled around to reveal a pair of very pissed off 7ft tall G-class SuperBUD security droids.

<I’ve told the master forty-five times now, you weren’t to be trusted. You and these scoundrels are permanently dismissed Miss LEE!>

What followed next happened in a blur.

The secretary pulled a fob from between her cleavage and with a singular actuation, the Bulter collapsed to the ground with a whir.

Pewter tackled the woman to the ground and slid under the kitchen table, just as a hail of electrically charged bbs rained from the SuperBUD’s wrist rifles and throughout the room ricochetting from wall to wall.

As the bbs struck my body, the rubber diffuser matt under my jumpsuit did its job and discharged the electricity into a battery for later use. The bbs themselves hurt like a bitch, but I’ll take them over tungsten parabellum any day.

Crashlogue was holding the entire weight of the repair bay over one shoulder and with a flick of his arm rotors, he hurled the 6ft metal coffin directly at the closest bot, pinning it back into the wall as it scrambled to right itself. From Crash’s chest cavity, sprung out my Coilgun and I caught it with practiced finesse. I fired off a volley of rounds at the still standing guard, the electromagnetic barrel accelerating the slugs fast enough to pierce steel. Two shots clipped its head, destroying an oculator, another two stuck center of mass. After five more rounds, the gun overheated, I dropped it and I grabbed my knuckles from the toolbag at my feet.

The woman who was tackled to the floor, kicked Pweter in the jewels and deftly rolled backwards onto her feet. “Secretary my ass!” I mumbled to myself. As she moved with the grace of a trained assassin. She withdrew a lipstick tube from her chest-pocket and clicked it to life with a large ozonated spark. Like a dagger, the lipstick few, crackling with enough volts to kill an elephant. It struck the perforated bot in the head, where it detonated in a blinding blue flash: frying the bot dead as it collapsed to the floor with a ground shaking thud.

After its initial impact, the remaining G-class effortlessly thew the repair bay across the room hurling fatally towards the Assassin woman. Before the 6ft long steel brick could decapitate her, Pewter spun on the ground and swept her legs out from under her, landing in his arms. The Repair Bay embedded itself into the plaster covered steel wall opposite it right where her head had been. Our assailant strode towards Crashluge, to eliminate the most dangerous obstacle.

I dashed forward low and swayed around to its flank, delivering a combination of metal-wrapped blows to its chassis. The coolant tanks just under the plating began to hiss and pop as the seals were broken. In tandem, Crashlauge took my lead and delivered a faster than eye barrage of left-right blows, battering its arms away from grappling him.

With the inner actuators of the arms fractured, I used all the might in my possession to pull its left arm backwards. The few remaining hydraulics and cams in its arms struggled against me, the gears grinding and skipping as its torque fails it. My practiced eyes scan its outer shoulder and my muscles reach their limit. I flick the stud in my Knuckles, extending a bit-shaft holding a 40H security-bit. I jam the bit into the shoulders back assembly and fumble my way into the hole. With the press of another stud, the screw is wretched from its housing and cast aside with a clatter. The arm comes free and I swing it like a bat as hard as I can into the back of its head. With a satisfying Gong, the SuperBUD’s service door swings open, revealing the BPU housing inside.

A single stud click is all it takes to swap the hex bit for a spike which I drive directly into the housing: instantaneously ceasing its higher cognition functions and task delegates. With nothing to drive it besides its combat readiness chip, the Lumbering bot, throws wild haymakers and roundhouses like a boxer whose lights have gone out but keeps swinging unconsciously. I collapse backwards covered in oil and ferrofluid. I signal Crashlogue to clean up. “Execute finisher number thirty sixth”

In my earpiece I could hear him sigh exasperatedly as he placed put the tips of his metal fingers on the enemy bot’s chest plate, before shifting it into a one-inch punch that blew the bots power core out its back. I crushed the power core under my work boot and the guards were no more...

---

“LISOF! I SWEAR TO GOD IM GOING TO KILL YOU! DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG IVE BEEN CASING THIS PLACE??!!”

Miss Lee as she called herself, began berating Pewter who simply smiled blankly while nodding. With his hands up in the air in a sign of good faith, Pewter did his best to placate her. “Ah Ellie my dear, you look as lovely as ever! You know, I was just telling ol’ Alak here that we could sure use a wonderful and talented woman like yourself on this job, wasn’t I old friend?”

I turned my attention firmly to my data pad, keeping out of their spat. “Hey, keep me outta this, and keep yer voices down! No alarms have tripped but it’s nearly the top of the hour, staff will shift through here on their patrol routes. We need to get our exit strategy set and get the hell outta here!”

They both turned away from arguing with each other long enough to chastise me for my forethought. “NO! IM STAYING TO FINISH THE JOB!”

I turned back to my datapad and looked over the mansion’s floorplan, in the back of the room Crashlauge was dismantling the Super Buds and making sure they wouldn’t reboot. The plans from the city archive were clearly spoofed, half the rooms on here were twice the size of the actual building. Did the archivists really not look these over? Or did the owner just pay them to ignore it? Either way, according to Pewter there ought to be a massive vault somewhere in the building, and time was running short to find it.

I checked over the plans one last time to find the best escape route, but there would be no leaving quietly. I turned to Ellie and Pewter who had finally stopped arguing, though the look on their faces told me I wouldn’t like their reconciliation.

Uh, so Alak, remember that huge payout I promised you?...

“Shit” – I muttered, knowing what was coming next.

“Miss Ellinora here will be taking the large collection of jewels we were gonna flitch, but she’s gonna help us get my prototype back”

“Crash: chokehold 11, version B”

Crashlauge sped across the room and put Pewter in a headlock over his knee while his victim pleaded for mercy.

“Ack! Wait! What I meant to say is that I’m paying you out of pocket for this one--- Gurk….”

I raised an eyebrow. “And Crashlauges cut?”

“Gah… I’ll liquidate some assets…. Scouts honor!”

As his face was turning red, he flashed a peace sign and I sighed. We were well past the point of no return here and low on time.

“Damnit; you swindler. Let ‘im go Crash, clocks ticking. Yo’ Ellie, where’s this damn Chip Pewters after?”

She had ducked into the pantry to slip into a tight bodysuit adorned with straps and holsters for all manner of blackmarket gear. She returned while tying up her hair into a ponytail and tossed me a keycard. I caught it and cloned the serial to my datapad before tossing it back to her.

With her hand on her hip she explained: “The mansion’s main vault is on the third floor, the whole building was structured around it. The floorplans mark it as the master bedroom. The only other human in the building is Ginman himself, but hes engaged in his… evening debauchery.”

“Huh, about that. The exploit should be triggering about now, I expect he’ll be more preoccupied with ‘safely removing his device’ than us….”

As if on queue an ear-piercing scream rang out throughout the house.

“That’s our queue folks. Yo Sticky fingers, you’re up, lets smash and grab!”

Pewter stood and dusted himself off, smiling as his time to shine came. “This way folks, try to keep up!”

In a blur he threw open the servant’s stairs door and fled up the back hallway. Ellie was after him and I had Crashlauge bring up the rear carrying the repair bay. The stairs led to the second floor, the back side of a hidden door slid open and we were in a large hallway.

“I smell treasure!” Pewter exclaimed excitedly as he ran haphazardly across the hall. His hubris caught him as a pressure sensor in the floor depressed. A 5ft section of floor the width of the hallway slid open to reveal an array of whirling blender-blades. Pewter cried out and bridged himself over the gap, the bottom half of his necktie shredded to bits. Ellie walked over his back with a sardonic “Ah, what a gentleman.”

I took a running start and cleared the gap with Crash right behind me. I pulled the lucky bastard up by his belt and dumped him on solid ground.

“Shame ya’ couldn’t smell that, huh?”

Pewter scrambled to his feet and silently nodded, a bit perturbed by his ordeal.

“Good point Alak.”

With a snap of his fingers something began crawling out from under his suit jacket. A 3-inch tall humanoid Micro-BUD crawled onto his shoulder and saluted him with its tiny grabber. Pewter saluted back and asked the bot to scout ahead for them. The conman tied a rope to its cellphone loop sized anchor point and commanded it forwards. It ran along the ground to the bend at the end of the hallway and saluted in victory. The master conman, gave us the ok gesture and dashed down the hall.

Immediately an ankle high laserwire was tripped, causing the entire mansion to ring out with a blaring and ear-piercing klaxon.

The curses of Ellie and I were drowned by the ear-splitting alarm clearly designed for psycho warfare. I fished for a pair of earplugs from my bag and tossed Ellie another pair. Pewter winced and pointed at his wristwatch indicating the limited time available before covering his ears in agony. With a flick of the wrist he tossed a dart into the nearest alarm, giving us a moments respite. Without a word he charged down the end of the hallway and we followed suit. Winding down the corridors left and right we passed a few Domestic BUDys who simply pointed and relayed their oculators recordings to central control. I had crash swiftly bust ‘em up, just in-case they pursued us.

We ascended to the Third floor where the vault was supposed to be. The hallway was in a U-shape with a large pair of double doors on the south side. I gave a hand gesture and Crash dropped the Repairbay on the floor with a thud. We lifted the lid and took out the hardware: Drill, Mounted Electon discharger, Laser cutter, shaped charges.

Crash held the stairs while the three of us threw the double doors open. Inside was a large lavish bedroom that looked completely un-lived in. I took a 5ft iron rod from the case and started tamping the ground, listening for abnormalities. Ellinora started tearing paintings off the walls looking for safes while Pewter kicked back on the fourpost bed and relaxed. Out of the corner of my eye I watched Petwer’s Micronoid crawl into the wiring conduits by ripping off a wall socket.

I tamped the iron rod on the ground dully until finally it rang with a ping. I fingered the floor until I found the lip, I lifted up a section of the carpet and revealed a steel welded hatch. I yelled over the Klaxon to get the attention of my accomplices. Pewter rolled off the bed and jumped over to the hatch, rubbing his hands together and putting his ear to the metal.

His face soured as he listened; his ducktail bent against the floor. “Electronic mag lock, offline redundancy, 4-inch steel. That bastard Ginman steals my dad’s life work and can’t even protect it properly!”

“Ellie my dear, what’s under this room?”

“The atrium….”

Pewter took four shaped charges and tossed them seemingly haphazardly along the floor. I yelled to Crashlauge to return and get ready. From outside the room over the sound of the blaring alarms, Crashlauge was kicked backwards through the air and skid along the floor coming to a stop at my feet. His fists were covered in red and black oil and his chassis was dented from combat.

<Cooperator: Security forces have arrived.>

I pulled his heavy ch-ass-is over the floor back behind where the vault was laid. Ellie was standing in front of an open wall safe stuffing jewels into a duffle bag.

“Move it or lose it!” I shouted at her as Pewter flourished the detonator.

Half a dozen Super-Buds elbowed their way through the door threshold and ran directly towards us. With gravitas Pewter took a bow and the floor exploded in a cloud of smoke.

The ground shook and crumble underneath us, the massive safe lost its upper anchors and dropped straight down through the gap in the second floor, through the atrium and burying itself in the basement. As the smoke was clearing, I looked for my accomplices. A nanowire cable was anchored to the bedpost and Pewter was already down in the lobby. There was a shatter of glass behind me as Ellie dove out the window, seemingly to her death. A moment later she rose to window height blowing me a kiss, shouting: “Have fun boys! Thanks for the Jewels!” Hanging on to her 3-ft tall avian USBeak Mini-Bud, she flew off into the night held in the talons of her aerial bot.

I sighed and cracked my neck; I slipped on my knuckles and prepared to slug it out with whatever SuperBuds were remaining. On the other side of the hole, three Security Bots lumbered forwards and leaped over the 15’x20’ gap with ease. The three enforcers grabbed Crashlauges leg as he was trying to right himself. The floor underneath us began to creak and groan. Everything flipped upside down as the entirety of the bedroom fell under the weight of the floor, crashing into the lobby below.

My legbone popped out of its socket as it caught onto something 10ft above the ground floor. I screamed out in pain and looked up to see Crashlauge hanging from the second-floor balcony holding my leg by the ankle. He released his arm and fell to the ground with a thud, catching me and dropping me to the ground. I stood shakily to my feet. My knee hurt like a sunova bitch and was swelling rapidly. Crash took out an autoinjector and stabbed my thigh with it before very roughly grabbing my calf and forcing the join back into place. I ground my teeth and swore. I limped a few steps and the numbing effect of the drugs kicked in. I stared at the carnage around us.

We were back in the atrium lobby we had entered through, the front door was directly ahead of us, but now reinforced with 4-inch iron bars. The metal cubic safe was only visible through the hole in the floor where is rested twenty feet below. I shouted down the hole: “You alive Pewter?”

No answer.

From behind me storming down the main staircase was a man wearing a pair of luxurious slippers, a house coat, and a Gynoid leg-wrapped around his waist thankfully covering his hardware. He winced as he walked. I recognized the model of droid as the one I had owned and uploaded commands to earlier. Its head was bashed in and the nylon wig on its head covered in blood and oil.

“YOU!!! YOU DID THIS! ACKK--” As he got to the bottom of the stairs, he fell forwards onto the gynoid, he cried out in pain and tried to grab his trapped member to no avail.

“I’LL KILL YOU FOR THIS YOU WRETCH! DO YOU KNOW WHO YOU’RE MESSING WITH? IVE GOT FRIENDS EVERYHWERE, YOU WILL NEVER ESCAPE ALIVE! I WILL RUIN YOUR LIFE!”

He spouted his vitriol into the bosom of the gynoid and tried to stand on his feet.

“CIRCUIT BREAKER DIVISION WILL BE HERE ANY SECOND NOW TO MAKE SURE YOU NEVER SEE THE SUN AGAIN!”

As if on cue, the metal bars on the front door retracted and the door was kicked open by a very large and very angry man backed up by three dozen officers in full tac-gear.

“FREEZE LAWBREKING SCUMBAG!”

The man in charge was wearing military greaves and had a large tac-vest on instead of a shirt. His torso was covered in scars and his wild eyes looked like he had seen a lifetime of horror in the military before heading up this division of Circuit Breaker. The temple in his shaven forehead twitched as he commanded his men to form a shield wall in front of the door.

I yelled out down the hole: “Now or never Cypher! Last chance for egress!”

Mr. Ginman crawled forwards past me and was helped up by two officers who began trying to yank the defective bot off of him with much groaning and agony.

In-between screams of pain, Ginman shouted: “Captain Harden! Seize this criminal scum and his accomplices! I’m pressing full charges! I want a death sentence or you can kiss your funding goodbye!”

Captain Harden didn’t seem too offput by the whimpering whines of the indignant socialite. He shouted at his men. “Escort Mr Ginman to the ambulance while I deal with this scumbag here!”

I cracked my knuckles, my vison was focused from the drugs and I felt like I could take them all on.

Just then, the floor began to rumble again. Pewters Micronoid appeared out of the hole and stood at the edge. There was some sort of expansion attachment on the back of its head attached to the BPU. A large red light pulsed next to some new radio wires.

The Micronoid gave a chirping battle cry as sharp and underwhelming as a 20th century pc-board-speaker. The lone little bot charged the wall of over thirty armed and armored Officers.

Then, came the rest.

Like the riders of Rohan, a thousand Micronoids burst out of the hole, charging in unison!

Like a mass of living cells, the clusters of bots formed a wave and washed over Circuit Breaker. Riding the wave like he was surfing a cloud was Pewter with a wide shit-eating grin on his face. He was carried out of the hole and straight through the wall of muscle. The linemen officers’ shields were broken through and a path was carved. Captain Harden was buried under the wave, his screams of revenge muffled by the hundreds of tiny feet stepping over him.

A thousand more bots, surged from the hole picking up Crash and I as we sailed over the sea of unconscious and dazed officers. We sailed through the yard and out past the gates knocking over every officer unlucky enough to have taken a shift today. I turned to pewter who had his hands in his pockets and was staring blankly up at the sky. In the chaos, I swear I heard him mutter something like: “Thanks for the gift pops…”

Letting the wave of bots take us where they may, I lay back and pulled my hat over my eyes. “Master con-man eh…. I’ve certainly had worse jobs…”

The sirens wailed as we escaped into the night;

--Our legend, had only just begun.

\\ To Be continued….