(TW description of gore and panic attack)
The day was proceeding nominally, initial tests of the communications device within reality showed great success, transmitting information through a plane other than the physical, even bypassing isolation chambers created specifically to block any possible realspace communication device. Android guards and assistants were running throughout the room, while not to my level of skill the androids own engineers had a greater familiarity with Maso technology than I, their aid increased the operations chances of success by a marginal amount, therefore they were included.
The device was smaller than originally theorized, barely the size of my suit of armor and scarcely wider. But it consumed four reactors worth of power, or 4 gigawatts of energy. If that much energy detonated there was a considerable worry it would wipe out a large portion of the factory, but the risk was minimal and failsafes were in place.
A glance around the room and through the systems showed all systems were ready, and I started the countdown. My guards tightened their formation around me, they were the original group to find the factory, 13B, 18B, 44B, 32D, 16S, as well as the two exceptional androids, 2B and 9S. It was an odd reaction to tighten the defensive formation, as if a physical threat would be arriving. The only potential dangers were instant annihilation or a digital attack. Though a magical one was also theoretically possible. None of those attack methods would be stopped by merely standing in front of me.
The machine started to let out an audible groan as the power started to increase and its conceptual components activated. It was a deep sound, felt deeper than the flesh and the room itself started to shake. The androids expressed minor distress at the occurrence, but it was well within the tolerances. The sound deepened and everything not secured down started to pulse and thrum in time with it, given this was a controlled setting the only non secured items were the androids and myself.
The seams of reality were being parted with the inexorable pull of the machine and the sounds were those same seams straining to remain intact. A physical indication the machine was working, and the sensor reading showed the same. They were slowly shifting to match the original baseline of the portal, only on a smaller scale.
The energy consumption of the machine double, and then doubled again a few moments later, the energy accumulators and new solar panel arrays being drawn upon in addition to the reactors, and the fabric of reality was finally parted, the energy draw lessened as the burden of opening a portal ceased, and the energy cost of maintaining it spread across two machines. The mind's own machine functioned on similar principles but achieved those by slightly different means, and the divergence was informative and fascinating. That was only a dim thought, the rest of me was far too busy reeling from the mental overload of once again connecting to my factory.
The minds reached out with a near frantic energy, latching into my psyche like they had never left and I felt everything they had felt since they had been disconnected. The fear, helplessness, desperation, and rage, I had nearly forgotten what emotions had felt like and I nearly staggered under the weight even with my suit holding me up.
The minds felt me in turn, my experiences and memories as plain to them as they were to me and they reeled with horror…. Tinged with the barest hint of shame and failure. That didn’t make sense at all, and I peered deeper into their minds to discover just why they felt like that and….. It it it it was all wrong what had I done to the androids! What had I done to myself!
My head was more metal than flesh, my lungs were just …gone. Why can’t I breathe! I need to breathe! Get this damn helmet off of me! I had… created software to make the androids violent bloodthirsty monsters, I had let them die dozens of times just to save on resource expenditure. Everything hurts! Do I even still have bones or am I just a sack of flesh in a suit? How much of my brain is even left……
I couldn’t breath, my lungs replaced with the suits own air filter directly aerating my blood. I clawed at my throat trying vainly to take a breath through lips that were sealed shut, my jaw clenching without teeth. They had shattered during the fight, pulverized by my jaw’s enhanced strength and I hadn’t seen fit to replace them, so much of me had broken and instead of fixing it I had just, let the suit handle it.
Get it off me! GET IT OFF! My clawing changed into tearing, and the relatively thin seam around my neck tore, blood pouring out through the gaps as my fingers dug under them and into my own flesh, I didn’t have any skin to keep the blood in, tearing through and severing the neck armor and taking a firm grip of my helmet. Then I started to pull.
Like an insect tearing its own exoskeleton off the helmet tore free with a spray of gore, shards of bone, muscle, veins, and wires all splattering over the floor, what was left of my eyes were barely within their fractured sockets, only the strengthened optic nerve keeping them from tearing free. The fractured remnants of my skull were only kept in their vague shape by the wires used to strengthen them.
My toothless and tongue-less jaw flopped open and I took a ragged breath, nearly choking on the torrent of blood that was still pouring down my skull. My last sight from my eyes and more esoteric senses were the androids simultaneously recoiling and lunging towards my form, while I kneeled in a growing pool of my own blood.
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The mind’s reacted quickly, Balistraia immediately taking control of the combat drone network and ensuring the perimeter was as safe as could be, Bulwark did the same with the static defenses. Byzantine rushed throughout the information banks to get an adequate understanding of the situation and Labyrinthine immediately coordinated a swarm of construction drones to ready the medical center, while assessing if the engineer was able to be moved.
His suits diagnostics were online, and showing…. Worrying signs. He matched none of his previous baselines, his form was only even humanoid because his armor held him in that shape. His spine was pulled apart and ripped in half from where he had torn his helmet off. His brain was nearly half metal, and what little Labyrinthine could tell about his organs showed they were also heavily augmented.
But he wasn’t in any immediate risk of dying, already the blood pouring from his open musculature and exposed sections of brain were clotting. Labyrinthine reached out to the surrounding androids and spoke into their suits speakers. “The Maker requires medical treatment, bring him to the bases medical center, gently, the drones will guide you” a stretcher had already been fabricated and ferried to the room, and the four battler series androids picked up the Maker like he weighed nothing, and set him down on it with the grace only machines could achieve.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
They each picked up a handle on the stretcher and lifted the Engineer with similarly impressive synchronicity, and Labyrinthine set the androids at a slow pace towards the factory's medical bay. Keeping a firm awareness of the engineers' medical systems Labyrinthine stretched their awareness towards the other minds. The non-combative nature of the situation meant Byzantine was the central authority with the Makers Inability to fill the role.
That just meant the Organizational mind was directing the factory at large, Labyrinthine was the mind with the greatest medical skill, solely based on its experience with finer detail work. None of the other minds interacted with the base components of the world to simply create or repair. That meant when faced with an issue like this they were practically helpless, and after their prior failures it stung with particular harshness.
Bulwark in particular had taken their powerlessness harshly, given they were the one with the most hand in cyber security and the Maker’s personal safety. But the other minds hadn’t been lax while Labyrinthine was ensuring the maker would survive in the short term, they had already read every log and file the Maker had, as well as done light scans into his memories, which were unusually clear and free from the chaotic flow he had tended towards in the past.
The Maker had engaged his Nanites, and set them to the highest level. Instead of merely repairing him to the baseline they would actively work to treat and solve problems arising. Labyrinthine narrowed their focus on the Maker even further, and found each and every nanite still active; they were even now trying to craft a new metal exoskeleton to prevent further damage.
The mind disabled them with more aggression than needed, the human body normally constantly broke down, and every time it did the nanites would identify the ‘issue’ that caused it and implement augmentations to prevent it occurring again. It wouldn’t have been an issue over the course of an hour, only a few cells being replaced with metallic components, but the Maker had left the nanites running for weeks. His blood had been filled with chemicals that slowed cell division and stopped his cells from self destructing when they had errors.
The resulting tumors and growths were simply replaced with more metal. It had been a self feeding cycle that would have turned the human into a machine in his entirety.
They would need to rebuild his entire body, no system was left untouched. Labyrinthine wasn’t even sure they could do an operation on the brain, even if it was likely needed. Not without the nanites, and letting them work again was simply not an option. The programming had been flawed.
The androids carrying the engineer finally arrived at the medical center, and Labyrinthine absently directed a few drones to clean up the trail of blood. The room's robotic arms grabbed the stretcher and gently set the Maker on the table. The androids backed away against the wall and watched the rooms arms pull sections of the armor off, the attached skin and muscles being severed so only minimal damage was done to the body.
It didn’t take Labyrinthine long to remove the armor and to start getting proper diagnosis without the suit blocking the majority of sensors. And once that was done the long hours of reconstruction began.
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An instance of Labyrinthine pulls away from the monotonous work, another arriving to fill its position and aid the other four instances present for the engineer's reconstruction. It joined the conflux of other minds and took a short look at what they were doing, Byzantine was trying to figure out what exactly the Maker had built and how his current factory worked, Balistraia was reconfiguring the patrol routes and combat drones and talking with a few of the androids, and Bulwark was directing a few instance of Labyrinthine’s self in rebuilding the defensive grid to their standards.
Labyrinthine composed and sent a message to the collective “the Makers condition is a stable as can be reached with current capabilities, focus should be put towards opening a portal large enough to transport him, or if infeasible a more advanced medical suite will need to be constructed” the message came with all relevant data on the engineers condition, and several plans on what could be done to improve it, as well as a theoretical list of what would need to be done for either making a larger portal or the materials needed for a larger medical suite, as well as the material required for both.
Byzantine was the first mind to respond, sending a list of available supplies, power generation, and a report on how difficult it would be to get more of either. Balistraia reminded Byzantine that the androids and machines could be used as a source for materials, and the estimates were redone with the new parameters. Bulwark brought up security concerns over bringing in outside help and expertise while their Maker was so vulnerable and security systems that could be used to keep him safe and others for how to prevent a portal shutdown from occurring again, Via a second set of equipment waiting on standby to reopen it if it collapsed or the in-use set was sabotaged.
None of the Mind’s thought the Androids or non-hostile machines would attempt to harm the Maker, but no chances would be taken. Labyrinthine set an instance to reinforce the medical center, and the androids still inside were asked to exit the room. None of the battler series androids seemed pleased to be leaving, and Labyrinthine had to admit there was an odd beauty in the way Makers maimed form was slowly being put back into a humanoid shape. The Battlers took up guard position outside the doors entrance, which Labyrinthine took no issue with.
The mind did spare a brief instance to wonder what the androids could be thinking, by all appearances the Androids that had been with the maker when the incident occurred were the closest thing that Labyrinthine’s creator had to friends. A message was sent to Balistraia to talk to them, it was likely positive social interaction would be needed to heal the Maker’s mind and it wouldn’t do for them to be too traumatized by the event to provide the requisite interactions.
Then Labyrinthine turned the bulk of its mind to the pending task of rebuilding everything, the amount of power needed to even think about opening a portal large enough to move the creator through would be greater than the total output by a factor of eight. The current power systems couldn’t even handle twice their current load.
It was likely it would need a dedicated power facility, which would likely be a geothermal plant. But deciding how to get the power was Byzatine’s job, Labyrinthine just needed to make sure the systems could handle the influx.