Survival

by Chris Wright

  With no warning at all, Jacob was suddenly enveloped by small Nano-bots, completely covering him from head to toe. Ed and Haziq watched distressed as a humanoid looking Nano-colony stumbled towards them, the faint cries of Jacob emanating from within the exoskeleton. Haziq decided they had nothing to lose, so he took aim with his small handgun and a series of shots rang out. They clanged against the metallic surface, causing the Nano-colony to disperse and fly towards the taxi defensively. Behind them they could see that Jacob was okay, apart from the two daggers sticking out of his appendages and a series of tiny incisions dotted around his body, where the swarm had been. He tried to run faster towards the taxi, where the Nano-bots were headed. The taxi had no choice but to close back up again, the Nano-bots crashing into the side of it and trying to saw through the exterior. Jacob suddenly realised the drones were right behind him and turned to see them fire their beams at him. He didn't have enough time to jump out of the way fully and both beams caught his left arm, the caustic incision making his flesh and bone bubble, along with the dagger that had made itself at home. Jacob screamed out loud as the foaming of his arm became more intense and started to work its way up towards his shoulder. With a sudden panic in his eyes he knew he only had one option, he had seen what happens if he let it be. With more courage than he ever realised he could muster, he placed the barrel of his gun in his right arm on to his left, closed his eyes and pulled the trigger. The fizzing section of his arm below it shattered away and dissolved on to the floor, leaving blood spraying dangerously from what was left of the top of his arm. It was that or be thoroughly dissolved.

  The drones had passed above him now and were swinging back to make another approach, all the while the Nano-bots sawing their way into the stationary taxi. There was no way he was going to make it to the taxi, he was losing too much blood, and that was if he could even get into it, his entry blocked by a hive of angry robots. His last option was to use the flame from his other weapon to cauterize the wound, something he didn't hesitate in doing. He screamed with more pain that he had ever felt in his entire life. Every other scream he ever made sounded more like a whimper next to this. As he did the unthinkable, he knew he had to dash for cover, the drones were turning back towards him for round two. He sprinted to the building to the side of him, his fiery weapon still held in place, and just managed to reach the inside before the drones had let out more shots. The beams fizzled through the building entrance, causing the walls inside to start melting down, simmering down to a stew.

  The taxi outside duly took off, the decision made to try and save two of their team instead of losing all three. It screeched away, still with the Nano-bots attached and now with the two drones in hot pursuit. It weaved in and out the streets, quick turns trying to shake the swarm off, but making no difference.

  Back in the building, its facade was slowly liquefying, and Jacob took a deep breath. He was out of immediate danger, but he had no idea what to do next. He had one arm missing, and a dagger sticking out of his leg. He didn't like his odds, but he refused to give up. He refused to give up even when the people inside the office building began to turn hostile, all of them attacking at once from all angles. His weapon saw off as many as it could, but they kept coming, like a swarm of locusts, over and over. The last thing Jacob saw was an eerie grin on the face of a young secretary, her beauty masking the violence she would hail down on him. With one more heavy crash of a stiletto against his forehead, the pain vanished, everything vanished into something else, and Jacob left the building.

  The taxi sped through the streets, Nano-bots in tow, drones in chase. Quick detours down side streets weren't enough to shake any of them off, and the incisions from their tiny hitch-hikers were starting to get through.

  “Can you hack these little bastards?” Ed shouted to his colleagues controlling the taxi.

  “We haven't got the resources to do those too, so one of you would have to take the wheel” the reply said.

  “Okay, that's probably the best option we have” Haziq replied jumping into the front of the car, “Get them to do it”.

  Ed did as Haziq requested and they waited crucial seconds for the changeover. Hacking the Nano-bots was tricky because they worked as a hive mind, each one receiving the same signals each split second and trying to find the master signal was hard with all the signal clutter. But it could be done, it just took trial and error. Less than thirty seconds later the car started to slow down and the Nano-bots backed away from the outside of the car. Haziq quickly took hold of the steering wheel and gained control.

  “Okay, can you tell me the way?” He asked Ed.

  Ed had the route up on his screen and immediately began the directions. The drones were still in swift pursuit, now ready to take aim after the Nano-bots had been compromised. As if automatically sensing the danger, the Nano-bot controller flung them all into the sky, heading straight for the drones. The next ten seconds was one of madness, drones and Nano-bots engaged each other in aerial combat. Beams of burning light despatched some of the Nano-bots, but there were too many to dissolve, the rest clinging to the drones. The drones started to morph into new shapes to shake them off, but they just clung on harder, taking the same form as the drones. The last attempt was to split each drone apart, try and catch the bots off-guard, but it was another failed attempt. The drones were completely smothered, the bots refusing to let go, and eventually they all crashed to the floor. The explosion was short-lived before the familiar chemical reaction caused the wreckages to boil away on the roads surface, breaking down the metal to leave no trace except for small craters on the surface.

  Ed and Haziq were overjoyed, and Haziq pressed his foot on the accelerator as he reached a wide-open road. It was only another mile to the camp, all they had to do was pray that the Elite wouldn't be able to catch them. They knew it was unlikely, they had been spotted, they had already been attacked, an attack that failed. They would be coming again soon. As it was only another mile, they decided to walk the remainder of the way. They turned the taxi back in the same direction they had just come from and carefully pulled over.

  “Can you take back control of this and drive it back into the city to cover our tracks, throw them off our scent?” Ed asked the base, to which they agreed.

  They climbed out, taking their weapons with them and watched as the taxi slowly pulled away, heading back to the smoky city in the distance.

  The Compound

  Mateo's laptop flashed up with a message, ordinarily nothing he would concern himself with, but today was anything but ordinary. He broke off from helping Emma to check it, just to make sure it wasn't something crucial. He scratched his head as if it hurt. Everyone else knew that wasn't a good sign.

  “What's the problem?” James shouted over, sitting there doing very little to be able to help at that point.

  “Some of the factions are close, they've found the back door in they were anticipating. An attack is imminent” He replied.

  “How imminent?” Sheryl said as she approached.

  “Hard to tell, could be minutes, could be an hour, but it's going to happen” Mateo said.

  “So that's bad yes?” Mike asked, wanting some proper clarification.

  “Very” Auton replied entering the room, “If my calculations are correct, we could be witnessing a series of events that could threaten everyone on the planet”.

  “Everyone?” Mike quickly replied back, “You mean-“

  “Yes, nuclear” Auton said almost matter-of factly.

  It was clear at moments like this that it didn't have proper emotions, which was just as well as they need it to be level-headed and not running out the room in panic. Those words got everyone's attention. They were expecting something big, but not that. No-one sane would cause such a domino effect.

  “Is he correct?” Mariam asked Danny, to which Danny shrugged his shoulders.

  “Probably. I stopped being the mathematical expert the second Auton walked back in the room” He said jokingly,
well half-jokingly. In fact, no, he decided, he wasn't joking at all.

  The calm room was starting to grow uneasy, people's apprehension and fear starting to rise into sweats and nervous pacing.

  “Do we have time to launch?” Samir asked hurriedly.

  “It's looking statistically unlikely. Our only option in my estimation is now Plan C” Auton said.

  There was the mention of Plan C again. But once again that's all that was said, no information on what plan C was. Everyone looked at Sheryl, who had a nervous look in her eyes. It was clear that she wasn't prepared properly for Plan C, and it seemed to be only her and Auton who knew what it was. If Sheryl wasn't prepared, then what chance did the rest of them have?

  “We need to get the craft back out along the tunnel and prepare it for launch straight away” She said looking around, panic-stricken, “Auton, did you have the back up plans in place?”.

  “Almost” It said, “I can work on the rest on the craft. I will just need a few minutes and Mateo's help to get the other system set up”

  Everyone else was now confused as well as terrified about what was about to happen.

  “So, are you going to tell us or not? What is Plan C?” Brandon shouted, by this time quite agitated.

  Sheryl took a deep breath, she knew she had to tell them, but didn't quite know where to start. She was hoping to avoid this, but it now appeared to be the only option left.

  “We all need to get on that craft too” She said eventually, breaking the nervous and terrified mutterings from the room, “All of us, before it's too late”.

  The Resistance

  It took Haziq and Ed less than fifteen minutes to walk the last mile to the camp. By the time they had got there, their colleague had already reached there to transport them to safety. He had already cleared their passage so that they hit no resistance on entering. These camps weren't going to let anyone just wander in, there was tight security all around, all necessary in these dark days.

  “There's a vehicle waiting for us on the other side of the camp” their colleague said, beckoning them to follow, “It's a short drive to the base from there, but we need to be quick”.

  “Yeah we've been trying to be quick Andreas, but the Elite seem to be infiltrating everywhere” Ed replied.

  “We think it's going to get worse” Andreas replied abruptly, “Our Intel is saying that some factions are trying to hack into the Elite's central circle and attack them from within”.

  “You mean hack some of the Elite? That's good yeah?” Haziq replied.

  “Yes and no. If it goes wrong, we could have bombs dropping on us left, right and centre” Andreas said concerned, “I was speaking to a guy I know in this camp just now, he seems to think someone in this camp is involved in that. He didn't say who, he didn't give any specifics, but was told to expect a game changer”.

  They continued racing to the other side of the camp, security guards hushing them through each section to safety.

  “Isn't that going to ruin our plans a little?” Haziq said. Their plan was a violent free one. It seemed some people couldn't wait to fight back. It could be a costly decision.

  “I guess we'll just have to adapt the plan somehow” Ed replied looking back, scanning the horizon.

  “Everything okay?” Haziq asked him.

  “I'm not sure. I thought I saw a couple of flashes on the horizon, like sunlight hitting something. I'd say it's nothing, but after the last hour, I wouldn't be so sure” He replied.

  A low hum was now heard faintly, and a flurry of activity began to occur in the camp. Everyone was sensing danger. Ed knew he saw something briefly, and now the camps systems had picked up a threat on the horizon. Haziq, Ed and Andreas began running, planning to get far away before whatever was approaching could reach them. The noise in the camp got louder and louder, a hive of activity beginning to rustle up towards the front. Scores of rebels ran in the opposite direction to the way they were going, each one brandishing whatever weapon they could quickly grab.

  They could hear the beginnings of gun fire and angry shouting, quickly followed by the sound of explosions. The floor beneath them shook with the force of the blasts. They sprinted harder as the sounds of the other rebels became ear-splitting, a mix of cries and angry firing weaponry. Ed glanced behind him to see a larger drone descending on the camp, one that seemed to split and rotate into successively smaller pieces to escape the approaching bullets, before re-assembling itself back together again. Another high-tech piece of kit the Elite were using for their nefarious goal, unleashing its full fury upon anyone who resisted. The Mother-drone began to spew flames down to the ground, one that engulfed everything and everyone in its path. There was no escaping it. The irregular gunfire could do nothing to stop it, and the flames spread ferociously through the camp.

  They were closer to the vehicle. They just had time to make it before Momma-drone's flames would be close enough to wrap their fiery arms around them, when there was a sudden burst of light, a quick flash. The guard sat in the vehicle they were running to was shaking his fist faster and faster. He was trying to tell them something, his eyes wider and wider in fear. With no further warning he turned the engine on and drove away, zero to sixty in seconds, leaving them all far behind.

  “What the fuck????!!!” Andreas screamed, unable to understand why they had just been left stranded.

  A quick glance round gave him the answer he was wanting. In the far distance they could make out the shape of a huge mushroom cloud hanging hauntingly over the remains of a far city, its shadow casting a foreboding terror. The Mamma-drone seemed to suddenly lose control and began diving towards them. They ran forward as quick as their legs could take them and began to dive down an embankment to a river below. The Mother clipped the ground, flames still shooting from it. People's body parts were wrenched away from them by the shrapnel, the lucky ones shaking hands with an intense inferno. Whoever was controlling it must have been incinerated in the blast, back at the faraway city. There was no other reason for it to suddenly crash like that, Haziq thought.

  Ed was behind the others as they started jumping down the embankment. Just as his feet left the ground, he felt a sudden warm pain. He stared in complete confusion to see his feet, and then legs, falling away down the slope leaving the rest of him behind. The shock turned to calm quickly, as his eyes watched the lower half his body make the escape downstream that his torso couldn't. His last calm but confused thoughts were that he was so happy that his legs had got away. The rest of him slipped away somewhere else, somewhere he was familiar with, he was certain he had been to this place before. His upper body lay half way down the embankment, the lower half stuck on some rocks as Haziq and Andreas were hurtled downstream, desperately trying to get away. They never realised that neither part of Ed had managed to keep up with them.

  They had no time to feel relief that they had got away, as they were busy trying to not break their arms and legs on the boulders littered around the river. The river twisted round corners, both of them being dragged with the torrents of water that were tumbling over rapids and further down the valley. Ahead of them, Haziq noticed a swarm of more Nano-bots that were heading straight towards them. They must have entered another Elite members' territory, one that was guarded on all sides by things like these. Haziq quickly shouted out to Andreas to avoid the swarm ahead of them, but Andreas never heard him. The rush of water splashing around his ears was deafening him, the pull of the water weakening him. Before he knew what was happening, Haziq had dipped his head below water and the swarm of Nano-bots had swooped down and grabbed Andreas by the head. They made tiny punctures in his skin, enough to give the bots all the leverage they needed to pull him out the river and thrust him high up away from Haziq's view.

  Haziq continued downstream, more Nano-bots giving chase. Every time they swooped down, he was able to duck his head under water, and avoid the same fate as Andreas. Time after time the bots swung in low, and he was able to pop his head back under and t
he bots would dissipate once more. There was a sudden loss of push by the water and Haziq suddenly noticed that gravity was now the main player on his body. Without warning the stream had reached the end of its high plateau and was flinging him over the edge of a waterfall. The realisation happened in slow motion to his senses, and it gave him the time needed to realise what was happening and grab on to a branch to the side of him. It stopped him from falling and he clung to the side of the cliff, as the water next to him cascaded down fifty metres below. He looked above him to see the swarm had returned and it swiftly started descending towards him.

  There was a momentary flash, the brightest flash Haziq had ever witnessed and he looked straight across the valley before him. The largest city in the country was normally over there, but all there was now was an ever-expanding wall of dust and cloud, the top of which was mushrooming out high into the atmosphere. The Nano-bots were within half a metre of Haziq, when there was a sudden rush of warm air, followed by a force that obliterated Haziq, the Nano-bots and everything else within a few miles. Thousands of years of evolution and countless ecosystems dissolved into the plume of hot rushing smoke, everything redesigned into ashes. This was just one of many scenes beginning to take form across the globe. They were all folding back the chapters of the planet to a blank page, where there was no pen to write with, and no story left to be told. Everything was wiped clean from where they had once stood.

  Outside the Compound

  They had all managed to lift the craft outside. The new surreal moment had overtaken anything else, what they were being required to do seeming impossible. They placed the craft on the ground in an opening and all stood there staring at it, silent, nervous, some of them even nauseous. After the brief pause, Gina turned to Sheryl, tears clearly visible.