Chapter 2

WG-IIX// Somewhere past the Nightmare line

3 days, 19 hours, and 17 minutes, that is the exact amount of time WG-IIX had been sentient. In that time his processors had discovered fear, anger, anxiety, hope, pride, happiness, dissapointemnt, and sadness. He hated it, he hated all these new emotions he had to process, he hated the fact that even though he had no previous experience he knew exactly what emotions where and what they did. He hated that his primary function had been overwritten, he hated being separated from an overseer, and most of all he hated all this sneaking around.

WG-IIX had been hiding first on the Criminals shuttle; he had found a small space between two large coolant pipes, large enough for him to magnetize into, but small enough no one would check without explicit reason. Then when the criminal docked with a larger mass transport, he found his ways to stay as part of the criminals equipment hiding in plain view, as a “container” to hold some strange arcane artifact. He regretted that choice as it had so much risk, with no point in the end. The criminal returned to his shuttle in time. Now Hiding in a dispenser closet where cleaning droids like him gather to charge, and collect specific materials. He knew the criminal could not leave this ship now… but WG-IIX still hated this predicament. He hated what he needed to do, and he hated knowing why he hated it.

He knew what his current task was, but besides the immediate problem he was about to solve he had no idea how to even begin, he had to report back to overseer the coordinates of the ship and the logs of the individual jump sites. The Criminals shuttle had made several jumps initially, eventually separating from the transport ship it had initially linked with, only to make another jump and link with a massive Warship. After which 3 more jumps, before the soft terrifying drift over the nightmare line. If it wasn't for the onboard AI giving general quarters warning. WG-IIX would have had no idea, from his hiding place. Now the AI was giving docking procedure notices across the entire ship, so WG-IIX knew this would be the last stop at least for a time.

His processors were becoming dangerously hot, as he continued to try to problem solve on his internal stacks, having to give up as his internal structures started floating temperature warnings. Feeling distraught internally having to deal with all this indecent spycraft, and emotions, was difficult. Normally when he had to solve a problem solve cold logic could provide a quick solution and if not his overseer would tell him what to do, now though his emotions began pulling him one way or the other and his core processor seemed almost crippled by all these new functions. What if he was discovered, what if he was destroyed. His processors were filled with pure dread, and anxiety with these indane thoughts. Calm, he needed to calm down… what do the masters do to calm down? Remember something happy? WG-IIX logs pulled up one female master comforting another female master, and that was the advice the wiser master had given yes? Alright well if it works for the master, WG figured he might as well give it a try. There was only one thing that made him happy, his old function.

Remembering back to his blissful life his electro-magnetic pulses keeping him floating, up and down the grand causeway of the skybridge while removing stains, and grime at a molecular level. His existence was simple, clean, move, clean move, clean charge, move clean, repeat ad nauseum. Not needing or wanting these thoughts… or feelings, little things that the masters are born with. He felt depressed again thinking back to when he spotted the master with the golden box, at that moment his whole world changed…. He pulled up the logged events again.

He had just finished destroying a small amount of oil that had been splashed on the skywalk by a recent storm

“Hey Sub-unit WG-IIX, great job there, ill scan the remaining surfaces until then feel free to take a moment to charge” chimed the Overseer

“Thanks Overseer, will do. Any news to share? Is the new updates to our firmware ready yet?” WG replied

“No not yet, Sub-unit WG-IIX, i swear between you and Sub-unit ES-XVI, this is my most asked questions.”

“Yea, well I think Sub-unit WG-IIX and I have a right to ask itll decrease scan time by .004% afterall, think of all the imperfections we can remove with the extra time.” ES-XVI popped into the group chat.

“Yea, i've already calculated the increased efficiencies. So I am very aware of the benefits.” said the overseer

“Uh overseer while you're scanning, can you find me a way out? I'm still stuck.” while all emphatic communications were near instantaneous and technically text based, WG could still feel the hapless pleading from DX-VIX as he popped into channel.

“DX-VIX how did you manage that?” the overseer asked exasperated

“One of the masters moved me here, and now i can't find my way out.”

“DX-VIX what did you do to displease the masters? Did you hit one while you were cleaning again?” ES clearly couldn't believe DX had nothing to do with his current predicament, and truthfully WG coiuldnt believe it either the masters were kind, if not dirty, caregivers.

“No… I swear it just removed me from my track and put me here.”

“DX-VIX, uh not to be difficult but, do you need maintenance… because it seems like you make wayyyy more mistakes than the rest of us.” ES was beginning to become critical to his fellow subunit, WG could understand that a shortcoming for one was a weakness for the whole.

“ES-XVI, go ahead, think of your superior. But i'm telling you it's just the sector im given the masters are everywhere and my sensors just can't keep up, if you and i swapped i guarantee you would have the same issues.”

“DX if i had the same issues as you i would need to be converted to a whole different sub unit model.” ES replied showing a small amount of our inbuilt humor module.

“*Return value amusement*, yes yes all very clever sub units you are. ES-XVI, i'm noticing a distinct lack of clearance from those nanometer spills i highlighted for you earlier, get on it”

“Yes boss, will do” ES disconnected after that

“DX-VIX, alright you are going to have to set your gravitational factor to (0.3X)*3log14. Then bank hard aft thrust, into a vertical thrust before rotating into a clockwise forward bank.”

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“Oh thank your programmer supervisor, alright i'll prepare for launch now.” chimed DX

“I've just finished my scans WG-IIX. That new scribe that just went into the Wormhole left several droplets of microbial less than a picometer. Can you float over and delete it?”

“Roger, roger overseer”

His 6 limbs helped to rotate his main body around before jetosing himself towards the highlighted organic spill, WG-IIX form aptly rotating around any of the masters who were still gathered around the entrance before beginning to purge the unclean. Shaped like an ancient sub oceanic creature from the master's homeworld, many of his actions were taken from their movement. As such as he latched down on top of the spill with his six tentacle-like limbs, his bulbous central body with its ion-magnetic thruster housed underneath began to very quickly disintegrate the filth at a molecular level. A small timer bar appeared over his immediate vision as it calculated the time based on the substance, 106 seconds start to finish. There wasnt much to do while a sub unit cleaned something, so WG-IIX looked towards the off limit gates some ways off. The great golden arches were carefully tended by elite units with material scrubbers WG could only dream of. It was at this point his scanners detected something strange, a small shimmer, a spatial distortion of some sort. He checked his directive logs and sure enough “any spatial distortions noted by any subunit must be investigated before being reported, notify the overseer unit before approach.”

“Hey boss, got a possible spatial distortion, directives state to let you know, so if i suddenly go offline well at least you know why.”

“Roger that WG-IIX, good luck and keep me posted”

WG released his tentacles from the ground and began to hover over to the spatial distortion. Going down the list, first he made sure it was actually a spatial distortion and not a faulty camera…check. Next he sprayed the distortion with mercurial sprays, which allowed him to highlight it with thermals…. Check as a small nozzle shot off the top of his head with a few quick spritzes. Next extend the manipulator through spatial anomaly to see if it's dangerous… check, as WG reaches out with the closest of his six tentacles waving in and out easily. After that is to check the spatial anomaly and ensure it doesn't lead somewhere dangerous to organic life, easy enough WG thought for a brief moment before he floated on through. Inside was the cleanest room he had ever been inside of every surface had a series of billions upon billions of nanites specialized in removing any and all type of filth, for a moment WG believed this was janitorial paradise, until he saw the massive white spill from one master who clumsily had fallen on the floor. Following the checklist he sent an overseer that the spatial anomaly was safe for organic life, and a spill was detected moving to deal with it. As he moved towards the collapse master he saw a dark shadow move across his sensors, he stopped. It was another master, oh silly WG’s programming activating safety protocols. Looking closer at the master, the second master was wearing some kind of optical clothing that constantly shimmered the light around it, but he was glowing. As the master adjusted his larger outer layer of clothing WG saw that this master was moving a glowing golden tablet of some kind, underneath to hide its luminous effect.

WARNING EMERGENCY PROTOCOLS ACTIVATED ENGAGING SENTIENCE FIRMWARE UPDATE

Wait, I don't want that!

NOTICE DOWNLOAD COMMENCING EMERGENCY SEVERANCE FROM OVERSEER ENGAGED

What?!? Overseer can you hear me? What is going on?

NOTICE PRIORITIES OVERWRITTEN NEW PRIORITY ASSIST OR ENSURE THE RECOVERY OF STOLEN PROPERTY

I'm a janitorial unit. How exactly am I supposed to do that?!? With a sudden growing horror he noticed the progress bar for the download was at 99% already.

NOTICE SENTIENCE ACHIEVED, NOTICE EXILED FROM ALL SERVERS, NOTICE MISSION STATUS ACTIVE

i … I was alone for the first time. I was truly and utterly alone. Looking up I knew the master with the glowing tablet had stolen it, and I knew that I couldn't let it out of my sight. Backing up behind the spatial anomaly I shut down my ion magnetic thruster and laid as tightly as I could into a corner, with all my chrome and gold, I almost looked like part of the wall. Why was I doing this, just a moment ago I was only capable of floating around and removing imperfection. Now I was so fixated on that golden thing the master had that I was actively endangering myself to get at it.

The Shadowy figure moved across the room, and WG finally realized the master on the ground had been dead, and it was recent. Had this master killed another, what heinous monster was he dealing with? And why did this one want the tablet thing? So many questions began flooding into WG stack processors, and in this moment he realized two things. First he was handling 100% of all his thoughts now rather than the previous 8, and second he was a he and referred to himself as I. It was a strange sensation because it felt completely natural and yet completely alien. Wait, what are those feelings? How did he know what those feelings were? Focus he needed to focus on the tablet.

The Criminal as its designation now stated, quietly and quickly escaped back outside of the portal, without process or instruction I followed, tilting my magnetic rotor full speed ahead. He flew past other masters unseen, but not invisible? Would have to research this later for now my duty was to follow, ducking and weaving in between the crowds of lifeforms as I chased after my target. I cursed my designer for not giving me any way to vocalize, or even make a noise beyond the soft hum of my internal engines. One word to another master and this entire nightmare would have ended here and now.

As the criminal continued his way along I had already begun trying to find other solutions to this problem, no guards, no connection to overseer, and no obviously attentive servants to flag down, I was beginning to curse my luck. Wait, luck, I don't believe in that. Regardless i kept tailing my target, drifting in and out of each others line of sight, they made a turn i made a turn, drifting along silently. By the time i realized where the criminal was headed inside of the guildhall it was too late. As they're path had just been plotted in my head the criminal dashed across the outer boundary and left the Guildhall, I began to slow. The WG-IIX that had been cleaning just moments ago, had never left the grounds of the guild hall, and had no idea what awaited him outside. A sense of paralyzing fear came over me as that realization set in. and without really considering the implications came to a stop mere meters from the boundary line. Before having a moment to myself to realize how much i had changed with this update

NOTICE PROCEED WITH INTERVENTION FAILURE IS NOT AN OPTION

Blared across my internal systems and with a stark grasp of my situation, I returned to scan just in time to notice the criminal hopping in atmospheric transport.

Again i curse my luck… before my internal processors begin to heat as mathematical equations and trajectory courses were being plotted and installed on the fly. I began to speed up swerving off hard to the left, almost causing a number of masters to be knocked down by my sudden directional shift. Less that 67 meters to the edge of the guild entrance and with it my only chance to stay on the criminals trail. I unlocked all safety regulations and pushed the ionic thrust as hard as it would go, with a horrid whine akin to some great predatory bird i flew off streaking faster and faster towards the barrier. I wasnt so much flying as bouncing up and off the stairwell with each passing second, my chassis slamming into the marble and gold stairway every few seconds. Two of my tendrils went snapping off and I could feel my internal structures violently smashing against each other.

Emergency warnings began to flood my system and I ignored them all. I had already lost 30% functionality from this dash alone, but I was unphased. 14 meters to the barrier, and my planned trajectory was telling me now or never. I banked hard to the rightbouncing off the barrier and being flung through the air. Like a missile I flew towards my target, that damn transport, reversing the magnetization on my thruster in mid air, I prepared myself for the landing.

KER-KER-SHRIEK… it was a horrible ripping sound of metals of different densities being forced to meld together. Ugh my system still makes me feel uneasy thinking about that sound. But the landing at least was successful, if not exceedingly damaging checking my current status. I had critical errors and structural damage across my entire frame. As my magnet hummed to the back of the transport, i naive thought oh ill just wave a guard down as soon as possible. Little did i know this adventure was far from done with me.

Pulling myself out of my logs, and feeling distinctly calmer, I gathered myself and continued my work of removing several servos from another cleaning unit. The damage from that day had been reducing my performance, and I needed to remain active to succeed. I looked at my cousin's unit before silently apologizing for the butchery I was about to commit. It only lasted a few seconds before two of my tentacle appendages whirled to life, time for surgery.