Crap! With Carnivac offline, I had no way of opening him up to get out and a [HotSwap] would expose me directly to the molten metal! I heard a thud as something big must have landed nearby and could feel Carnivac’s body getting moved.

“The body’s toast but Jhaix will be angry if I don’t at least grab the core.”

I think Traluna said something but I couldn’t make it out.

“Sorry, Lord Jhaix...”

I heard the sound of crunching metal as Carnivac’s body jostled and shook. With a grunt of effort, Gree wrenched open the torso, ripping the chest off. I wasted no time and lashed out with my arm blade, catching Gree in the throat. He stumbled back, a look of shock on his face, slapping a hand to his neck.

“What??” Gree screamed, “What the hell is that thing??”

I jumped out of Carnivac’s remains and hit the ground, diving between his legs.

“[HotSwap(IronHide)]!”

IronHide’s shell wrapped around me and punched Gree in the kidney. He cried out in pain, stumbling forward. I grabbed him by the back of the head and his belt and drove him face first into the wall. His body drooped, stunned. Before he could recover I spun around with him and hurled him in the direction of Traluna, who had started climbing down to get closer to the fight.

She shrieked and cowered as Gree’s large body smashed into the metal stairway she was on.

“[HotSwap(CloudBurst)]!”

IronHide digitized away back into my [Inventory] as my CloudBurst armor took his place. I powered up the wind turbines and shot into the air. The area was too full of debri, catwalk, and random obstacles to trust using the Blink Engine. I dodged through the levels and was nearly at the open window when a bolt of that cursed purple lightning hit me. One of my wind turbines exploded and I went tumbling through the window. Close, I was so close!

I hit the ground and tumbled through a manicured lawn, making a mess of it. I pushed myself up and looked around the courtyard. It looked like it would be a lovely spot for a lunch picnic with a couple of benches, shrubbery ringing the courtyard, windows looking into the building, and a picturesque tree growing in the center. A cherry blossom, maybe? Ugh, come on Prime, not the time. The sound of a single person clapping drew my attention to a second story balcony.

There above me stood Jhaix with that smug look on his face, clapping in that condescending villain way. He was flanked by two of his valkyries, one red and one purple.

“What on Earth are you? I can’t wait to take you apart,” he said with a sneer.

“Earth?” I asked.

“Old habit, pay it no mind,” he said, waving dismissively.

Something that looked like a red version of King Kong pulled itself up and smashed out what was left of the window I’d crashed out of. Traluna was cradled in the crook of one of its arms. The ape gently set her down and shook its body as it shrank in size and the fur receded. When it was done, I saw the red orc from the Trone guild hall that Carnivac ran into.

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“Girls,” Jhaix said slowly, “fetch.”

The valkyries spread their wings and vaulted over the balcony, gliding down. I doubted they could actually fly with them though. I converted my arm cannon and shot them both out of the air with [Liberator.exe] rounds. When they hit the ground, they both started convulsing. Jhaix didn’t seem particularly upset, more curious than anything.

“Gree,” he said, flicking a finger in my direction.

Gree shifted into the form of an Oni and punched his fists together, stalking in my direction. Traluna began chanting and I could see purple electricity crackling around her staff. Before she had the chance to complete her incantation, another bolt of lighting hit her in the back. This one appeared pure white in color and it took my optics a moment to recalibrate.

Everyone’s attention was drawn to the prone form of Traluna moaning and struggling to push herself back up.

“How did you...” Jhaix trailed off. I just shook my head.

Something from the otherside of the shrubbery with glowing white eyes screeched and lashed out with a long tentacle or tail, wrapping it around Traluna and pulling her back, behind the bushes and into the shadows. We could all hear Traluna screaming as flashes of purple light went off, casting monstrous shadows on the building before everything went silent.

Nearby the place that Traluna was attacked, I could see the upper half of their lizard girl healer, Sarissa, poking out of the bushes. From a distance, I couldn’t tell if she was unconscious or dead.

Not that I didn’t want to know what was going on, but I wasn’t going to get this chance again. I looked up into the sky and used the Blink Engine to [Blink] myself into the sky above the building, transformed into jet mode, and started [Blink]ing in the direction of home.

I’d been [Blink]ing since I escaped from the Factory but it was a super dangerous method of travel. If anything were to fly in front of me and I didn’t notice in time, I’d end up trying to pass through them at unthinkable speeds. I once tried using [Blink] to shoulder check a wyvern by instantaneously moving to a spot just on the other side of the creature and ended up completely obliterating Cyclone’s arm and shoulder, reducing the wyvern to vapor particles, and causing a shockwave with a 50 meter radius.

I’ve also managed to once run into the side of an airborne dragon bigger than a house in the middle of the day. Thankfully it wasn’t during the [Blink] action or I would have been Prime pate. Just running into a brown bat in the dark here would atomize the bat and cause catastrophic damage to me. Using [Blink] didn’t build any momentum though, so when I’d stop, I would drop like a stone.

I used the Blink Engine to take me as high as I dared before cutting it off. I pitched my nose forward and aimed for the ground until I built up terminal speed. Granted I lacked any sort of instruments to tell me my speed, so really when I felt like I was going pretty stinking fast I leveled out and would glide until I started losing altitude.

Like this I repeated the process until I reached AutomaTown. One thing about a non-sleeping robot village, it was well lit and an easy target to navigate by in the middle of the night. On my first test flight with CloudBurst, I hadn’t worked out how to slow down, nor how to land, which resulted in a crash that took me offline for three days. Come to think of it, other than running into people, the only safe landing I’d made was early tonight by shifting to Carnivac when I got close to the ground and nearly stalled out for forward thrust.

Well crap. No more Carnivac. No Cyclone at the moment either. The roadway from my shop down to the fountain at the center of town was a pretty straight shot, and at that moment I could only see our resident impressionistic artist, Joleen, out for a walk. If anyone stepped out of their residence they’d get plowed. Fingers crossed.

I lined up my approach and opened up full flaps to act as air brakes. I made a mental note to design proper air brakes. I still felt like I was going pretty fast, I wouldn’t want to face-plant at that speed. Alfred ran out from the inn and gently pulled Joleen to the side to keep her safe. The buildings and ground whipped past me, if I was capable of it, I’d be sweating bullets. I pulled my nose up and converted back to bot mode.

“[HotSwap(LandMine)]!”

My CloudBurst armor dematerialized around me as the LandMine armor replaced it. The instant it was in place, I converted into cycle mode and dropped hitting my rear tire hard on the roadway. The force of the drop bounced me forward into an endo but after some wobble I was able to get it under control and bring my speed down further.

I reached Alfred and Joleen and converted into bot mode, putting the armor back into storage. Alfred slumped tense shoulders and looked over at Joleen, who was perfectly calm, then to me.

“Good to see you back safely, sir,” Alfred sighed, giving me the sensation of pursed lips that he didn’t have.

“Ah, Master Prime. Lovely evening. I have some new charcoals that I’d love to get your input on,” Joleen added.

“And I’d love to see them. A little busy tonight though. Shall we arrange a viewing for when I return from the Capital? Thank you Alfred... it was a near thing...”

“I know sir.”

“Ah. Yes,” I pursed my own non-existent lips, “good night Ms. Joleen.”

“Good night Master Prime, see you soon,” she said, giving a friendly head tilt and a wave.