Aerys narrowed his eyes, before bullets started raining towards him and Joel Hartmann. The glass windows shattered before he dived, leaving Hartmann sitting like a duck. Joel also followed suit without looking back to see what had caused the glass to shatter. He crawled to the other side of the table, where Aerys was crouching.

“What was that all about?” asked Hartmann.

“I don’t know.”

He peeked at the robot, before a noticing a blood trail. He looked at his abdomen and realized that he had been shot!

The robot entered through the broken building windows, and scanned around the area. Aerys took out a gun, and crawled closer to Joel, who was now panicking.

“Gentlemen, I would rather not destroy this building and kill innocent people. I simply request Mr. Joel Hartmann to show up and I won’t open fire again...” came a voice from the robot.

“You just shot him!” shouted Aerys.

“And who might you be? I haven’t seen you before”, said the robot.

“You haven’t seen me before? Who are you?” asked Aerys, stroking his beard.

“It doesn’t matter now, does it?” replied the robot.

“We need to take Hartmann to the hospital. He’s injured!” declared Aerys.

“Okay. Let me fly him there”, said the robot as it edged closer to where the two were squatting.

“Wait!” shouted Aerys, as he came up, hands in the air, and laid the gun down.

He slowly walked towards the robot. However, as he neared the robot, he saw that there were two drones flying outside the office, looking directly at them. Something was wrong here! He didn’t know what it was, but this robot was strange.

The robot went behind the desk and retrieved Joel who was now unconscious. Aerys looked on as the robot flew off with Joel. The secretary came in moments later with some security guards.

“We heard gunshots, the elevator was not working so we used stairs. What happened? Where’s Mr. Hartmann?” said the secretary.

“Where were you?” asked Aerys.

“I was downstairs”, she replied.

Aerys frowned deeply. Her office was closer to the main entrance of the floor. If she went downstairs to get security guards, then that would explain why she was late. However, why was she even here? The security guards had guns, if there was a shootout that would mean she would have been in danger. The fact that she was here meant that she already knew she’d be safe.

“Where’s Mr. Hartmann? Is that his blood?” she asked again.

“He has been shot by a robot. Probably one created by his company”, replied Aerys.

“Don’t tell me ...”

The Pirin was flying smoothly towards the Megapolis Central Hospital. Everything had happened smoothly. Even though Dr. Paige hadn’t expected to see anyone there, no one tried to stop him from taking Joel Hartmann. Now it was time to execute phase two of his plan. The robot landed at the hospital, and shortly after, some paramedics came with a stretcher, carried the unconscious Joel and went in.

“What happened? We got a call that someone had been shot”, said a female doctor who was standing by the entrance.

“Hello Tess, it’s been a long time hasn’t it?” said the Pirin.

Tess’s jaw dropped wide open.

“W-who are you?” she asked backing away slowly.

“Don’t be afraid. Have you forgotten me already? After I went through trouble helping with your thesis”, said the robot.

“A-Alan?” she said.

“Take good care of him, I’ll be back soon”, said the robot as it ignited its thrusters and flew off, leaving Tess with her mouth so open you could fit an egg.

On reaching the hideout, the Pirin went in while humming a tune. It was quite a weird scene, a robot humming like a human.

Blue Rose followed swiftly, but before going in, she took out the EMP device in one hand, and the small gun in the other. She had been given orders to wait for the target at Joel Hartmann’s office. However, she hadn’t expected the crazy robot to start shooting the moment it arrived. She then followed it from the ground, to Megapolis Central Hospital and then finally the hideout. Things were going well, for her at least.

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“Dr. Paige?” asked Rive in a low voice.

“I have returned”, replied the robot. It continued, “Everything went well. I...”

Before the robot finished speaking, all electrical gadgets in the room, including the robot, switched off abruptly. Footsteps echoed as something, rather, someone walked closer to Rive.

Rive began to feel a cold sweat running down his spine. What was going on? The answer was obvious. They were finally here, meaning his time was up. He wished he could say goodbye to his family.

The lights turned on, revealing someone wearing black clothes.

INTRUDER ALERT! INTRUDER ALERT! INTRUDER ALERT!

The intruder alarm sounded, which surprised Blue Rose. Every electric device should have been shut down, including the lights and the intruder detection alarm!

She looked and saw Rive hung down by cables. Without saying anything, she pointed the gun at Rive’s head and fired.

BANG! BANG!

She moved onto the next room and found her next target, unconscious, with a helmet on his head, while on a small bed. She pointed the gun at the helmet, and emptied the cartridge. After making sure the mission was finished, she prepared to destroy the evidence.

“Hello little bunny”, came a voice from the next room.

Blue Rose was perplexed. She looked at the body lying lifeless on the bed, and then looked at the source of the voice. It was a spherical device with small white lines, converging on one point. The device had large valves where the cables were connected, and it was dark blue in color. It was suspended by four pillars, which were tied together crudely by thick cables. The white lines were glowing faintly.

“Hello little bunny, surprise...” said the voice again.

“What the...” before she finished speaking, a cable came down and electrocuted her. She fell down, before slowly losing consciousness.

This time the Pirin started moving on its own accord. It took the girl’s body and hung it from a position aside from Rive’s lifeless body.

When she came to, the Pirin was staring at her, while a loud hum was sounding from the spherical device.

“Oh, you’re finally awake. Good. Now, tell me who sent you!” demanded the voice.

Blue Rose looked around and saw small barrels aimed at her, protruding from the Pirin’s arms. She could tell that they were guns, and any false move would result in her joining the person by her side in the underworld.

“I don’t have the patience for this! Tell me who sent you or I’m going to finish you right now!” said the voice again. This time the Pirin fired a warning shot which simply grazed her cheek.

She sighed and then replied, “You have five seconds to release me and I’ll pretend nothing happened, but I’ll still finish you off.”

“Oh, a threat? In your predicament?”

“Five...”

The Pirin fired another shot, but this time the bullet went into her left arm.

“Four...Three...Two...One...”

As she finished, she stomped her foot into the ground, and all the lights abruptly went off, as well as the Pirin and the spherical device. A small dagger appeared skillfully appeared in her right arm and she cut the cables hanging her. She dashed towards the spherical device and cut all the cables connecting to it. Then she headed for the exit. A few seconds later, the lights came on, and the Pirin initiated pursuit.

‘Why was this guy not dead?’ she thought. This had gone beyond the scope of her mission. Everything that had happened was unexpected. How was he controlling the cables and the robot?

“You can run but you can’t hide, little bunny...” came the voice again, but this time it was coming from the Pirin.

She managed to get outside, but she knew she was far from being safe. She cut her hoodie into a clean strip and bandaged her arm to stop the bleeding.

“Where are you, little bunny?”

This crazy robot was annoying. How was he still human? She reloaded the gun and shot at the robot as it appeared. The bullet went right into the head and there was a spark, followed by a short circuit. At least she had done some considerable damage.

“Liiit...” the voice faded as the robot shut down.

To make sure, she still stomped her foot, since she had hidden the EMP device in her shoe. However, after a few seconds, two drones came out from behind the robot and started firing at her. She dodged most of the bullets as she took cover behind a tree.

‘What on earth is going on? Why aren’t these things staying off?’ she thought.

The robot switched itself on again, and then started walking towards her.

“Little bunny... Come out wherever you are...”

She noticed that she had been shot twice, in the arm and under her arms, by the ribcage. Currently, things were no longer going well, for her at least. She started thinking about her next move; after all, survival was now top priority.

As she was thinking, loud gunshots sounded, followed by a small explosion, then all went quiet.

“Are you okay?” came a familiar voice.

Now, PI Robotics had four data centers, one in Megapolis and the other three in the capital city of Griffinia, a country neighbor to Zimikhstan. The data center in Megapolis was close to one of the research centers, and their networks were connected together by a virtual private network.

Inside the data center, one of the terminals suddenly switched itself on, and an upload progress bar could be seen. After the progress bar was filled, simultaneously in the closer research center, a humanoid robot switched on.

A gruff voice came from the robot, followed by a cold laugh, well it sort of sounded like a laugh.

“Whoever invented the network deserves a Lobel prize. Thanks to the backup system, I was able to reserve my consciousness. Pity I lost the Pirin. Well, I have to retrieve it and repair it. Oh wait, isn’t this place supposed to be guarded by...”

Before the robot finished talking, some guards came into the room and they were holding guns. They scanned the room, but didn’t find anything unusual, after all, there were five robots in the room, and they all appeared switched off.

“Are you sure the sound came from this room?” asked one of the guards.

“Yes I’m sure. Unlike some people, I wasn’t sleeping”, replied one of his companions with a hearty laugh.

“Oh well, nothing out of the ordinary here. Let’s go”, said the first guard.

The guards left after scanning the area again. A few minutes the lights in the room were switched off. Two red lights appeared, and these were the eyes of the earlier robot.

“I almost got caught. Crap! Hmmm. I wonder if I can create an army of robots without these fools knowing...” said the robot with a lowered voice.

Some minutes later, another upload progress bar could be seen on the terminal in the earlier mentioned data center. This time, some drones in the research center started flying off, as if they were being controlled by something. A few minutes later, they landed and everything went back to normal, as if nothing had happened.