Nawx (Project IzeBorn Book 1)

by Andrew Jones

  "I... Gotta go. Shall we meet up again later on?" He asked.

  Blaze smiled as she leaned back against the wall, watching him walk forward, "I'd like that."

  "Accessing memory file 011-998-0334... Buzz Buzz... Corruption and rage fragments found inside memory file... High risk of contamination found in the fragments, immediate memory termination required to ensure safety and repair maintenance for user... Requesting access... Buzz Buzz... Access Denied... Hacking process is a go... Buzz Buzz... Buzz Buzz... No password is required due to hacking... Buzz Buzz... Access to memory file has been opened..."

  The interrogation room was for the machines who disobeyed Drenawx's orders- the machines who would fight back against their experimenting, or the machines who protest against their own kind, and the Human race. There were apparently machines who attested to any kind of beings living in this world and believed that this world was too beautiful for anyone to ruin. Blaze became curious from that thought, as she seemed to pass a group of protesting machines who were rioting against it. She didn't give it much attention, but she felt like Drenawx would be all over it, dealing with the machine's traitorous deeds. It made her wonder what he was doing since she hasn't seen him or Augur much lately. She pressed her hand on a switch that was next to the door, enabling the door's opening and allowed her to walk through.

  It was another hallway- but instead of hallways, there were actual cages. The cages were small, and it housed the more crazy machines. Machines that would jump toward the glass wall that would separate them and Blaze and snarl at the sight of her. She kept her calm look as she walked passed them, ignoring any and all comments the crazed machines made toward her that were either rude, sexual, or threatening. It was pretty brutal, but it didn't effect her too much.

  She pressed on the switch that would open another door, seeing the doors open. She peered her head into the room and saw Augur sitting on a hospital bed. He was panting heavily and looking down at the ground. Blaze rushed to his side and took his hand, looking up at him.

  "Are you all right, Augur?" Blaze asked.

  Augur grunted and pulled his hand away from her. He stood up and shoved her to the ground. She was frightened, she had never seen him act violently at all. Blaze crawled backward, away from him and stood up.

  "Augur, what's wrong!?"

  He looked up at her and gripped his hands into tight fists. She saw them shaking violently. He used so much strength in his fists that the skin on his knuckles snapped off. The material under his skin was not mechanical, it was pure flesh from a Human. But he was still acting strangely.

  "You wanted to know what it was like be Human... Well, look! This is what happens to Humans when they become corrupted!" Augur yelled.

  Blaze grunted, "N-No... Augur, you need to calm down..."

  "What he needs to do is let himself be examined." Drenawx's voice appeared as he entered the room behind Blaze.

  Blaze grunted as she watched Drenawx step into the room casually, grabbing onto Augur's wrists and forcing him onto the hospital bed.

  "Blaze, I am experimenting on the Ruse virus from the outside world. You are not to be in here." Drenawx explained as he tied Augur's arms and legs to the bed.

  "W-What are you doing to him?" Blaze asked, shaken by the new sight of him.

  "The virus will only enhance his emotion and become what it is that brought Humanity into the brink of genocide. Only, I ejected more doses of Ruse into him, out of pure curiosity, to see how he'd react."

  "You brought that damn virus in here, risking contamination, because of your own curiosity? Why would you do that to Augur!?"

  Drenawx laughed, "He was a mere test dummy. Like you, Blaze. Maybe that's why he cared so deeply for you. He had those same feelings for you, after all."

  "R-Really?" Blaze asked hesitatingly, her face growing a bit red, but she shook it off.

  Drenawx grabbed his tablet and spoke into it, "Guardians, take Blaze back to her vault and schedule her dismantlement for tomorrow."

  Blaze gasped as she heard the door behind her fling open aggressively, feeling herself being grabbed by the big guardian machines.

  "N-No! Augur! Leave him the hell alone!" Blaze shouted as she was dragged out of the room.

  The guardians carried her and held her with great force as she heard the screams of Augur from the other room. She stopped her resisting, watching the door of the room as her eyes quickly became watery.

  "Permission to terminate memory files 011-998-0332/0333/0334..." Chip says.

  "No, you stupid chip! Stop asking that!" Blaze shouted in her head.

  "Continuing to allow the memory files in the brain would corrupt the user's brain functionality, which could result in immediate death or rage against one's own self. Do you wish to continue holding onto these memories?"

  "Yes. Forever and always."

  Verse XIII

  A Return Not Welcomed

  Blaze ached and whined as she slept, as she did so Kryptonite watched over her. He was tending to the hut- trying to fix it up. But he couldn't do very much, he was constantly worried about everything, mostly for Blaze. With her, he felt like they were the only stable people living in this world. Everyone- and everything else was destroying each other.

  Tossing and turning on the bed, Blaze sat up and yawned. She brushed her hair out of her face as she looked down at Kryptonite, sort of wondering what he was doing. He was looking at her like he was suspicious of something.

  "What?" She asked.

  Kryptonite gasped, waving his paws around, "N-Nothing!"

  Blaze watched him for a moment before turning herself onto the side of the bed and stood up slowly. She glanced out the window and saw that the daylight exposed itself; clear blue skies, with no sort of distortion around. It made Blaze even more cautious.

  "Were you having a bad dream last night?" Kryptonite asked as he was sitting on the floor, reading some sort of magazine, "You were grumbling a lot in your sleep."

  She kept her eyes outside the window, having no reaction to what he was saying, "I'm fine."

  She muttered softly as she stepped outside. Kryptonite shook his head as he thought nothing of it. He forced his button eyes down into the magazine once again. She had gone to where the campfire was, looking down at it and seeing the logs had been burnt to black. The logs were still somewhat warm, she had felt it when she knelt down and messed around with the logs. One of them fell over, and a spark of flame shot out from the bottom. It alarmed Blaze, not all that much.

  Standing up and sighing, she wrapped her arms around herself and whined softly as she shut her eyes. But she quickly opened them, hearing Kryptonite approaching from behind. He was carrying a big log- well dragging it actually. He wasn't strong enough to carry it. He wasn't big enough to even hold it. She watched him tire himself out as he tossed the log into the campfire, quickly wiping some sweat off his bright green cotton fur.

  "I'm assuming this will be our main hideout, so I've been preparing for a long stay," Kryptonite explained as he pulled out a lighter from his pocket and attempted to light the logs on the fire.

  She didn't say anything, and just let him do what he was doing. But she immediately looked to her left, like something had literally turned her head toward that direction. A big coat of black smoke had risen from the trees that consumed the sight's area. She wondered what that was until she realized that was the direction of Amaya's Village from here. She looked down at Kryptonite as he fiddled with the logs, burning his paw again as he aggressively tried to catch the logs on the fire.

  "Isn't it a bad idea for you to light fires? You're flammable too, you know." Blaze grumbled.

  Kryptonite shrugged his shoulders, "If I burn up, I burn up. It'd be a better way to die than how this world is dying out."

  Blaze looked away, "Yeah. I'm going to go take a walk. I'll be back soon."

  Kryptonite nodded his head when Blaze started to walk off toward the direction of the black smoke. He was too focused on trying to
start a fire, it was seemingly irritating him. He was stubborn that way. But she didn't want to bring him along. She knew that he had a close relationship with Amaya, and if something had really happened to her, he'd be crushed. She had a feeling he's already lost someone in his life, so she didn't want to burden him.

  As soon as she got away from his vision, she dashed deep into the trees, quickly dodging the trees that would occasionally block her, and she even dashed clear over a widened lake with no problem. She stopped, however, when she got a glance at the same sign her and Kryptonite saw when she first entered the village. It was cut off, except for the little stick part that was stabbed into the ground. She leaned down and picked up the sign, but with black writing over the village's name it said, 'Village of bitches'. She dropped the sign, just as she looked down the trail to the village, dashing quickly down it like before.

  She instantly heard screaming deep in the village, as the sight of flames overshadowed the once peaceful village. Not waiting for anyone to open the gate, she jumped over the gate with ease and glanced around, looking for anyone on the streets. She only saw piles of bodies that looked like someone intentionally stacked the bodies in orderly ways. She ran toward the pile of bodies and looked through them, accidentally letting the pile fall over, and watched as the bodies fell all over the ground. None of them looked familiar, so she becomes somewhat positive that Amaya and Jet were all right.

  She rushed to the marketplace where it was quiet and empty. It was much different the last time she was there. It was a crowded mess, with people crowding their way into the front of the market booths. She walked to Jet's booth, where Jet's mechanical leg was cracked in half and thrown onto the blanket Jet was sitting on the last time she was here. Blaze turned her head toward the area with the hospital building after hearing more of the screaming, the screaming sounding a lot like Amaya.

  She panted as she ran toward the area of the scream. When she arrived, she saw Jet on the ground. There was blood surrounding his body, where his body was riddled with cuts and stabbings. She grunted as she pulled out her spear and ran further down the trail. Buildings continued to materialize into her vision as she kept up her pace, hearing more and more screaming. But she stopped when she saw two men, one holding Amaya by her neck, and a bunch of children cowering inside a building. One of the men turned around after he had heard Blaze's footsteps and heavy breathing.

  "Oh, well if it isn't Blaze. I've been looking for you." Drakkar spoke with a huge smile on his face.

  Densetsu turned toward her, throwing Amaya into the window of the building to frighten the children, "Blaze? We finally fucking found you!"

  Blaze crossed her arms as she looked at them, "You've been looking for me? Well, I wasn't far. In fact, I saw you at the abandoned factory a few days ago."

  Drakkar gasped, "I knew you were there. We obviously grabbed the wrong robot, then."

  "Robot?" Blaze asked.

  "... Machine, whatever the hell you guys want to be called."

  Blaze rubbed her head, "You two are still idiots."

  Densetsu laughed and pulled out his dagger, pointing it right at Amaya, "Nah. We're not. Especially since we've managed to infiltrate this village, kill off most of the inhabitants, and find you. So, get your ass over here, and we'll spare these twits!"

  Blaze grunted as she took one step- but as she took her step, she saw Densetsu stab the dagger into Amaya's throat. She screamed as she held the blade over Densetsu's grip, trying her best to pull the blade out of her, but Densetsu tightened his grip and twisted the blade to cause more pain to her. She couldn't talk, or breath; as blood poured out of her neck and down to the ground where she seemed to die within seconds.

  "Oops," Densetsu muttered as he grinned at Blaze and licked the dagger clean of her blood.

  "You should've just came to us when you had the chance. You would've been able to spare the lives of many."

  Blaze stood there speechless while her attention had drifted toward the dead body of Amaya. She frowned at Drakkar and Densetsu before dashing over to them and using her spear to slash against them, passing by them in a burst of speed. They managed to block the attack, but Densetsu's dagger was cut diagonally from the blade. He growled as he tossed the dagger.

  "Ugh! You piss me off so much!" He yelled as he grabbed the sword Drakkar wielded and took it from him.

  Densetsu ran at Blaze and slashed against her in multiple different directions, but it was easy for Blaze to block and dodge each of his attacks. After one of his slashes, Blaze stabbed the tip of her spear against his elbow and made his grip of the sword weaken. He let go of the sword as he raised up his arm, and watched as the sword flew up into the sky and stabbed into the top of a building.

  He screamed in pure rage as he grabbed onto Blaze's neck, tightening his grip. She choked, but she was still able to use her spear to stab him right in the stomach. He grunted from the pain and appeared to have been weakened by the impact of the weapon, but he still tried his best to tighten the grip he had on her neck. She screamed with all the energy she had as she noticed that Densetsu's eyes had grown red. She stared at them, knowing that this was the first time she's seen a Human infected with the Ruse virus.

  Knowing the stab in his stomach wasn't enough, she pulled out the spear and quickly stabbed his forehead, which automatically forced his grip to weaken and drop her onto the ground. Blaze couldn't stand up, and she felt like she was going to pass out. She deeply breathed in and out, not noticing Densetsu who was screaming and trying to block the hole in his forehead to prevent the blood from pouring out of him.

  "D-Drakkar!" Densetsu shouted. "Are you j-just going to let me d-die!?"

  Drakkar hadn't moved an inch, he just watched as he was dying, and also watched as Blaze was struggling to get any air into her systems. Blaze grabbed onto the wall and used it to help her on her feet. She ignored Densetsu, he was basically already dead to her, but she had targeted Drakkar, while she had her spear pointed right toward him.

  "H-How... How did you contract Ruse?" Blaze asked, coughing for air as she spoke.

  Drakkar frowned, "It was a noble sacrifice, in order to help secure Humanity- or help myself survive. What you don't understand is for one to survive, one must sacrifice others-"

  Drakkar was speaking, just as his eyes had changed into a deep red color, and his skin started changing into the color of darkness. But he was stopped, just as a sword was stabbed into his face from behind. The sword cut into his face diagonally and was then cut from the top to the bottom, cutting his head in half.

  "H-How could I die like this..." Drakkar spoke as the top half of his head slid off and hit the ground, right in front of Blaze.

  Blaze grunted as she had her spear ready for any attack. Her breathing levels had gone back to normal, but her state of mind was still on high alert. As Drakkar's body fell to the side, she saw a woman who looked almost like herself. She looked straight at Blaze with no emotion in her face. She also had a man standing behind her, who also had no expression on his face. They looked as though their souls had been taken from them, and they were acting upon someone's actions. Blaze held her head tightly, as it started to hurt immensely.

  "N-Nova... And Atreyu?" Blaze spoke, trying to overpower through her pain.

  Nova spoke, with the same expression on her face, but the tone of her voice took on a malfunctioning robotic voice, "That's right."

  "Warning- systems indicate a hacking threat. Attempting to override and eliminate the hacker." Chip spoke.

  "H-Hacker!?" Blaze yelled as she looked at the two of them.

  Atreyu spoke with the same malfunctioning robotic voice as Nova, "You are to be like us. You are to help create a perfect world for Lilith."

  "Lilith? I know that name somewhere..." Blaze whispered as she could only hear the alarm Chip has set in her head.

  Atreyu and Nova both point their weapons at Blaze, as their eyes glow a red color, speaking at the same exact time, "Join us."

  Blaze
backed away as she frowned. But she noticed that Densetsu's sword she hit the top of the building that had overshadowed them had cracked throughout the building structure. She heard the crashing sound of the building, and she took that opportunity to jump away from the building's impact. She watched as the falling pieces of the building fell down to the ground, right on top of Nova and Atreyu. She began to run out of the village in a frantic state, leaving all the dead bodies to get crushed, and the machine children as well.

  She panted as she stopped at a fairly same looking spot outside of the village. She couldn't help but cry as she thought of the destruction that occurred there. But she couldn't figure out how she knew those two. Were they machines? She thought so because they had the red eyes, that looked fairly different than the red eyes Drakkar and Densetsu had. She believed they were machines who were associated with Armagna. Maybe, Lilith, the familiar Synth was the one who is responsible for the mysterious network.

  Not much longer, Kryptonite approached Blaze as he grabbed the bottom of her black dress and tugged it. She looked down while wiping away her tears, seeing him open his arms. Blaze quickly picked him up and saw as he hugged her.

  "I know it's all hard, but we'll make it through..." Kryptonite spoke softly as he hugged her.

  Blaze said nothing, she knew he had an idea of what happened in the village. Who wouldn't know from all the sounds of destruction coming from the area? She let him down and sighed, looking toward the village with a frown on her face.

  "Kryptonite... Do you know the way to Drenawx's laboratory?" She asked.

  Kryptonite looked surprised to hear about that, but hearing it gave him some kind of idea of what she had been thinking.

  "Yes... You think this network has anything to do with Drenawx?" He asked.

  "I do. I can feel it."

  Kryptonite laughed, "Always go with your gut, Blaze. There's actually a secret passageway to his lab around here in the forest."