System Ascension

by Prax Venter

  Their sharp hooves skidded to a halt in the grass when they drew close enough to see him. Again, he felt their intense scan as they scoured every inch of him, wishing they had found someone else.

  “False alarm,” one of them said.

  “So close, though!” another said.

  “He’s out here. I know it,” said a third.

  This was becoming a pattern. “Who are you looking for?” Mark asked.

  “Jay Ward. Have you seen him?” The mechanical creature lunged forward and clamped onto Mark’s arm. Ahnix hissed softly, but Mark held his other hand up and silently asked everyone to chill for a second.

  “Never heard of a Jay Ward, no. I’m Mark, and maybe my friends and I can help you find him.”

  The metal face of the creature in front of him pulled its features down into pleading desperation.

  “Please. Find him and bring him back to us.”

  “Come on. It’s not him,” another said, looking over its shoulder. “We’re wasting time here.”

  A few others broke off and raced back to the watchtower, but the one grasping Mark’s arm looked him up and down one more time before reluctantly following the others.

  Vale waited until they were a good distance away and then turned to Mark.

  “There was a Jay Ward that came up a few times when searching the net for fusion research information. He was one of the top scientists in the field.”

  “Was? Is he still alive?” Mark asked.

  “He was before the Update. No idea now.”

  Mark grimaced and scanned the steep slope ahead of them. They had to pass through four more of the patchwork land types before they reached the top.

  They were stopped again in a frost-covered tundra, and then in the high brown grasses of a savanna. Both times, a group of metal constructs that vaguely looked like succubi rushed them and then left disappointed, but hopeful. And the groups were getting larger as they traveled higher up the squares of unique environments. By the time they ventured into a swamp, about fifteen of the creatures surrounded them. Several flares were shot up into the sky and a red glow slowly drifted overhead.

  “I’m not Jay Ward!” Mark yelled, putting his hands up before any of them could speak.

  The creatures stomped their hooves into the muddy ground as they vented frustration and mumbled the same words all the others repeated endlessly.

  But then Mark heard something new that really caught his attention.

  “It’s your fault!”

  He was positive that the one who hurled the accusation would be holding a quivering finger pointed right at him, but instead what he saw was that she was calling out one of her own fellow hunters. Mark couldn’t tell the rest apart, but this one looked slightly different than the others. She had gold-flecked, green eyes implanted into a shiny mechanical frame. Some of the feathers on her wings were pure, white and real-looking.

  “It’s one of them!” one of the other hunters shouted behind Mark.

  “One of who?” he asked.

  “It’s all your fault!” The unique, green-eyed hunter drew her musket and was about to blast the closest normal construct when she was erased by several blasts from the others, catching Mark and his girls in a brief crossfire. He flung out a silent question along their bond, but none of his own were hurt.

  “What the fuck!” Mark yelled. He wasn’t really expecting an answer, but one of the creatures who shot their own kind spoke softly in response.

  “Some of the angry ones make it back up through the core. They don’t belong here.”

  “They say he’s dead!” another shouted.

  This triggered several more to vehemently deny that Jay was, in fact, dead. The familiar mumblings began, and the metal construct hunters dispersed into the swamp to hunt their elusive quarry. Mark watched hopeful sadness ooze from one of the creatures as she actually picked up a muddy rock to look underneath. Jay Ward wasn’t under there, so she stalked off and continued her search.

  “I get the sense we may be fighting soon,” Ahnix said, her black tail flipping.

  Mark faked a pout. “Good thing Roo has that new death laser…”

  The velvet-girl reached over and put her arm around his neck. “I can’t help that I was created as a bad-ass death machine!”

  Vale cast her gaze up toward the top of the pyramid world. “Let’s go find this core.”

  The final patch of land was cracked earth, resembling an ancient dried-up sea bed. This high up on the pyramid, there was less surface area, and it wasn’t long before they finally crested the top and saw a white sheet of metal covering the summit with an enormous jagged hole cut into the middle.

  Mark was relieved that they didn’t have to climb the stupidly steep slope any longer. He wondered why his digital calves ached and determined that the wrap must be interpreting some difficulty they faced as they pushed forward though this AI’s home system.

  “There’s a hole,” Vale said.

  “Yup,” Mark agreed.

  “You all know we gotta jump in there, right?” Roo said, her black eyes twinkling as she gazed into the pure darkness beyond the smooth circle cut into the white metal surface. It was wide enough for them all to fit, so they all linked hands and jumped in with only the slightest hesitation.

  - 13 -

  Mark had time to notice that he was standing in a stone brick hallway before someone started shouting behind him.

  “You killed him!”

  He looked over his shoulder at the person hurling accusations and saw another mythologically shaped drone sprinting out of an unnaturally black archway. There was no doubt about her intentions this time. She had a long black sword pointing directly at Vale. Ahnix’s instincts had been right. He and his girls braced for combat.

  Vale projected a shield as the creature closed the distance on sturdy legs, her metallic hooves sending up sparks off the granite floor. She had a full set of pure white wings made from real feathers, and Mark thought she almost looked angelic- almost. Her metal skull face twisting with pure hatred marred that possibility.

  A black beam from Roo struck the creature, and she froze completely still under the velvet-girl’s Paralyze ability.

  “Good. We have time to figure out-” was all Mark was able to say before another set of clopping hooves echoed to them from the blackness beyond the archway.

  A second creature appeared and focused on the scene before her.

  The construct leveled her sword at Roo and yelled, “This is all your fault!” Then dashed around the frozen clone of herself.

  “Enough of this,” Ahnix said and performed a tearing motion with both sets of claws. A series of white energy ribbons slashed at both attackers. Chunks of static became dislodged like globs of code were being deleted. Mark could tell that she did some damage, but both creatures remained intact. The Paralyzed one remained Paralyzed, and the attacking one only faltered a step as she took the cat-girl’s Wind Claw attack on her forearm.

  Vale surged forward and met the winged creature before she could close any more distance. The giant naga used her glass Wall to block a violent sword strike and countered with a Power Fist to the face.

  The woman-shaped robot flew backward, and the damage Vale caused with her powerful right hook must have been enough to finish her because the goat-legged creature shifted into static, then nothing, before she even hit the ground.

  While this was happening, Roo obliterated the Paralyzed winged robot with a blast from her new Firebolt.

  Just as they had destroyed both of their attackers, the sound of clomping hooves echoed from the archway once again.

  Vale heard it too. She held up both hands, palms out, and created an enormous shield covering the black tunnel. Mark saw a pair of metallic ram’s horns impact the glass Wall with a thunderous bong sound. Two seconds later another powerful collision struck the glass, and a crack began to form in the center of Vale’s shield.

  “Let’s move!” Mark yelled. “We need to get away from th
is archway.”

  Everyone agreed and followed him down the stone brick hall in the only direction available. Ahead of them was another archway that appeared to lead outside. It was night out there, and Mark saw a flash of red light periodically flicker in the blackness beyond. They were almost to the exit when Vale’s magic blockage shattered behind them, and the clomping of several sets of metallic hooves scraped angrily against the stone floor.

  Mark exited the end of the tunnel, put his hands on the waist-high stone wall in front of him and tried to quickly take in the madness he was seeing. The words epic battle settled into position quite nicely. Either his perspective was way off, or he was seeing giant versions of the winged creature (that just had to be Jezebel SK3) locked in physical combat over an enormous gravestone. Swarming around the hundred-foot tall, sparring giants were thousands of the normal-sized versions, covering the ground like a sea of metallic angels. Crimson lightning silently flashed among the black clouds swirling above, bathing everything in a deep, blood red.

  Looking left and right, he noticed a broken column of stone blocking the way and got an idea.

  “Hide, over there!” he yelled and felt only a slight hesitation from Vale and Ahnix along their bond. They were preparing to fight, but they sensed his confidence and followed Roo. Mark vaulted over the stone debris and barley came to a stop before closing his eyes and popping out a Ghost.

  Without looking back, phantom Mark sprinted back along the narrow stone ledge towards the tunnel they had just exited. He intended to draw their pursuers away from his girls with his disposable projection. When he sprinted past the opening and saw the two angry creatures galloping out of the tunnel, he had to duck under one of their sword blades as it sliced through the air only inches away from Ghost Mark’s head.

  He was able to gain a little bit of ground along the length of the path as their hooves skittered for purchase and renewed pursuit behind him, but his eyes were ultimately drawn out into the vast expanse of clashing metal to his left. He was currently on a stone ledge near the top of an impossibly large pyramid. Across a great distance was another pyramid of equal height and torrents of the Jezebel creatures poured down its side to clash around the oversized grave between the two armies. His moving perspective on the battle below allowed him to catch the hundreds of flying specks hanging in the air locked in aerial combat. Flocks of the metallic females with angel wings violently collided into one another, and Mark’s eyes followed a handful of black dots falling from the sky.

  One of his pursuers must have caught up and skewered him because Mark opened his eyes and sucked in a breath back at his original position.

  Ahnix’s exotic eyes caught his as she leaned sideways, keeping her tall ears from poking over the broken hunks of stone surrounding them. She held up a furry finger to her small mouth, and Mark nodded.

  “They did this to him!”

  “Their impatience took him from us!”

  Mark could see two more white-winged robots run out of yet another tunnel, located on the other side of their crumbled stone hiding place, and run down a stairway to join the battle raging below.

  “I think we’ll be fine if we whisper,” Vale said quietly. The giant naga positioned her torso in a central location and wrapped her scaled body around the group for protection. Her scales actually blended in with the ancient, pockmarked stone around them and provided added cover.

  “It’s an insane warzone down there,” he said. “There are two seemingly equal sides, each constantly spawning an infinite army.”

  “She’s fighting herself?” Roo asked, cocking her head to the side.

  Ahnix turned her exotic eyes from Roo to Mark. “These versions seem to think Jay Ward is dead.”

  “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I saw a huge grave in the middle of the battlefield.”

  “That’s probably where we need to go,” Vale said, her eyes scanning over her coiled body for any threats.

  “That’s not going to be easy.”

  “When is it ever-”

  Mark finished for Ahnix. “-easy. I know. But there are giant ones and flying ones, on top of like millions of those things on foot- with swords...”

  “Those things are Jezebel,” Roo said, a small pout on her lips. She really felt bad for this AI. Jezebel did seem pretty broken up over this Jay Ward fellow.

  “She’s mad at herself,” Ahnix said quietly. “That’s what this place is… she must have killed him.”

  Another metal Jezebel ran out of the tunnel behind Mark and yelled out into the battlefield.

  “He’s gone because of you!”

  Mark waited until the pissed-off AI copy had joined the melee below before he spoke.

  “We need a good plan, Vale. You’re the tactical expert- what’ve you got?”

  Vale’s vivid eyes caught his, and she nodded. “Okay- Roo. Logout still an option?”

  The velvet-girl turned her attention down and then gave Commander Vale a thumbs-up.

  “Good. Ahnix, try and see if you can spot any point of interest near the grave Mark mentioned. Mark, feel like seeing how close you can get on foot before your Ghost pops?”

  “Roger that, ma’am,” he said with a smile and a salute. Mark closed his eyes and created a non-corporeal, remote-control version of himself. He waited until no one would see him emerge from their hiding spot behind the broken stone pillar, and then took off down the stone walkway that wrapped around the granite pyramid.

  Back by his real body, he heard Roo ask, “What about me, Vale? What do you need me to do?”

  “I need you to help protect Mark’s body.”

  “Oh, I can do that.”

  He couldn’t be sure because he was full-on sprinting down a flight of stairs and trying not to trip, but he might have felt Roo’s soft arms wrap around his torso.

  Then her hot breath sent goosebumps down his whole right side when she whispered in his ear.

  “I can’t wait to suck your cock again.”

  Hurtling forward as fast as he could, Mark stumbled and pitched into the sharply-cut, stone stairs about a quarter of the way to the bottom. The damage to his face caused him to open his eyes back at his original position. He looked down and patted Roo’s forearm.

  “I love you too,” he whispered.

  “I could be wrong,” Ahnix said nearby. “But I am relatively sure there is another hole in front of the gravestone, in the middle of the burial mound.”

  “I’ll try again,” Mark said. “But those stairs are treacherous, even if no one notices me. There must be tens of thousands.” He closed his eyes and created another clone.

  This time, instead of taking the stairs he simply jumped over the wall and slid down the perfectly smooth pyramid to the bottom. None of the Jezebel murder bots seemed to notice him, so once he hit the ground, Mark sprinted over the black, porous landscape and straight toward the towering gravestone.

  Winged-clones sprinted to either side of him, their metallic hooves clomping with a great collective thunder. Accusing shouts similar to what they had all been saying echoed around him like battle cries as they surged forward intent on defeating their hated foe- themselves.

  The ground shook in the telltale way that something significantly large and unseen was closing in behind, and Mark risked a glance over his shoulder. Emerging from a huge archway at the base of the pyramid was one of the colossal versions of Jezebel S3K. Her metal hooves slammed down behind Mark, and he tried turning abruptly, but it didn’t matter. The dim shadow of a massive hoof came down on him, squishing him instantly.

  He sucked in a breath as he opened his eyes back amongst his girls.

  “Okay, I really want to do this. One more try.” He closed his eyes and summoned his third ghost. Using the same strategy as before, he slid down the sloped side of the pyramid, but this time the newly spawned giant Jezebel was further into the battlefield ahead of him. Smiling, he began sprinting the moment he hit the ground. Ignoring everything, Mark’s single focus was catching up t
o and staying behind the giant woman. Its stadium-sized hooves were dangerous, but maybe he could use them to his advantage.

  Mark made it farther in than he ever had, and he saw the powerful legs of the regular-sized Jezebels move into his peripheral vision. He tried not to pay their thundering hooves any attention, because if he sprinted forward in the same direction, they didn’t seem to want to change targets.

  It wasn’t long before he ran into one of the front lines. It was chaos. Countless white-winged robots with deadly horns, hooves and swords whirled, charged and stabbed within a perpetually replenishing melee. The constant din of accusations and hatred made it hard to think.

  Mark paused for a heartbeat, looking for a way through the maelstrom of metal- but pausing was a mistake.

  Movement to his right caught his eye, and he had just enough time to put up his phantom hands before the tightly curled horns of a Jezebel passed through his chest at a full-tilt ramming speed, popping his Ghost.

  Mark came around back at the top of the pyramid and felt the world spin a little before settling into stillness. Maybe there was a limit to how many times he could do that in quick succession.

  “Yeah- it’s a blender down there,” he said. “There is no way the four of us will ever get close enough.”

  “There’s one way,” Vale said, putting up a finger. She held it pointing upward until understanding washed over him.

  “Right- The magic carpet ride.”

  “There are many aerial threats, but we can probably turn away the few attacks we may incur,” Ahnix said.

  “Ooo, I love riding your Wall!” Roo said a little too loudly, and they all cringed, waiting for the accusations from one of the many Jezebels. No attacks came, and they carefully timed their plan to the environment.

  “It’s all your fault!” screamed a white-winged robot, before running down to the battlefield- and then Vale made her move. With the flick of her hand, the giant naga summoned a larger version of the platform, and Mark could physically see the effects of her experience gains.