[Point of View: ARTI5] [https://segfault.tech/per-astra-ad-aspera/arti5_pov.png]

“Alright, listen,” Melwenn said, lowering his rifle. “You heard that? That warning was not about us. Your ‘Master’ is in mortal danger. So, where is he?”

“I don’t know.” I truly did not. That had never been an issue before. All I knew what that Master spent his days either somewhere in this building or, on rare occasions, at a station orbiting the planet.

“Okay, fine. Anyway, these people are coming to destroy you and kill everybody in the building, you got that? So, we’ve got an exit two floors above, but we have to hurry. Is self-preservation a thing you have?”

Yes, I did have a preference for staying alive. Of course I did! But what about Master? If there’s a danger to Master, am I not supposed to go protect him? Especially since, as I understood the situation, I was the very reason for the attack.

That seemed the most likely cause. Perhaps Master had been less than prudent when registering for that event, and we were now facing the consequences he had warned me about.

I did not understand why people felt artificial intelligence represented such a danger, and definitely not how they could go to such extremes to eliminate it. Truth be told, at this very moment, I wished I was as dangerous as they thought me to be. Perhaps then I could protect Master. But no, I was virtually defenseless. Even these people were considerably more deadly. They had weapons. If I had those…

“You’ve got to help me rescue Master!”

“Look, I wish we could, but you don’t know where he is, and we don’t have time to figure it out. We don’t really have the firepower needed to stop that army, alright? It’s already going to be fucking dangerous getting you out of there.”

So simply asking did not work. What could I do? Oh... Oh! Emotions! I had to communicate emotions!

“Melwenn,” I said, making a pleading face I was sure would have made Master proud, “please help me?”

“Ugh... That ‘Master’ guy spared no expense, did he?” Melwenn sighed. “Listen, we don’t have time to argue about it. Our mission was to retrieve you. I’ve got no problem rescuing your ‘Master’ as well if that helps, whatever, but we didn’t plan for a standout with an armed group. At this point, I’m perfectly willing to give up on the mission to save our asses. Sure, that means no pay, but hey, they don’t pay us if we’re dead, either. So, basically, the choice is yours: are you coming with us, or are you dying here alone? You’ve got about two minutes to decide. You’re capable of making choices, aren’t you? That the whole reason we’re in this mess, isn’t it?”

It was. And that made it my responsibility to get Master out of the trouble I caused.

“Might have to serve its creator regardless of danger,” Lena commented. “Would your ‘Master’ prefer you leaving without him, or you being destroyed?”

That was a tough question. Trying to guess what Master would want here was difficult. I was not exactly partial to the results. Knowing that, I had to truly choose what would benefit Master more, regardless of the cost to myself.

“Good point,” Melwenn said. “Anyway, if they somehow end up taking your ‘Master’ alive for a trial, you’d serve him better by not being here to be shown as undeniable evidence.”

That... was not something I had considered. If my staying here actually presented a danger to Master, then surely Master would not want me to. Since I could not help him anyway, leaving felt like the best option. Master would simply send word whenever I should come back.

“Yes,” I said, “you’re right. I’ll go with you.”

“Great! Let’s go then.” Melwenn turned toward the door. ”Alban, shut down the jammer for now. We’ll probably need it at full power soon.”

Alban powered off the device and put it back in his bag.

“Names?” Lena suggested, before Melwenn could reach his destination.

“Oh. Right. Good thinking,” Melwenn commented, before pointing at each member of his group in turn. “I’m Melwenn, this is Lena, and this is Alban. So, what’s your name?”

“Autonomous Rapid Thinker - Iteration 5,” I replied. “ARTI5, for short.”

“So, uh... Five?”

“That’s what Master calls me.” Not really a name, was it? Just a number.

“Great! Five it is! Anyway, if everybody’s ready, let’s go!”

We left for the stairs, with them in formation around me. Alban in front, Lena at the back, and Melwenn next to me. I would have preferred taking the elevator, but it was out of order, likely because of the emergency in progress.

Before opening the door to the stairway, Melwenn stopped the group and instructed me to stay quiet no matter what. I nodded my understanding. He signaled the go-ahead and opened the door to let Alban in. I followed.

At long last, I was leaving my sanctuary and entering a new world full of possibilities.

These were... disappointingly mundane stairs. Nothing to see that was not strictly required to be there. No wondrous ornaments. Just gray stairs leading up and down a rectangular shaft. There was a black grid with a handrail for safety and a few naked lightbulbs. Who designed this? I knew Master would not have stood for it. Even his barest of simulated environments had more decorations.

Alban hugged the wall, aiming upward as he slowly progressed up the stairs.

I followed him, raising a hand to grab on the nearest guardrail. It was too high for comfort, but I chose not to let it bother me.

I could hear footsteps coming from above us. To my horror, I realized we were not alone in the stairway. They sounded distant, though.

Lena and Melwenn joined us, moving silently. Our progress was slow and methodical, keeping all eyes on the next corner in case someone dangerous came down.

Nobody did.

We went up the two floors without trouble, stopping at a door nearly identical to the one from floor 4, but painted blue instead of gray.

Lena briefly pointed at the ground near the base of the door, but I failed to figure out what she was indicating. The other two nodded in agreement, so something was being communicated somehow.

Melwenn took Alban’s role, aiming his rifle up the stairs. Meanwhile, Alban placed himself left of the blue door. Lena went on the right side and used the handle to slightly open the door, allowing Alban to see inside. He carefully targeted the opening and moved laterally, no doubt to see more of the floor ahead.

After a few seconds, Alban nodded and Lena opened the door further, letting him to go through. She used her rifle to gesture me to follow him in.

I felt as if the footsteps from above were getting louder, so I rushed through. Since I had no feet, moving faster was just as quiet, anyway.

Now clear of the door, I immediately looked back, expecting to witness the incoming firefight. What I saw instead was Lena coming through as Melwenn kept the way open with his foot.

Looking around, I noticed the architects had shown more originality with the design of this floor than with the stairway. I had expected something identical to the one I had hitherto spent my life on, a single hallway leading to various large laboratories, with gray tiles on the floor. But no, they made this floor for some other type of work. For one, it was carpeted. An unfamiliar sensation for me. I could already see the downside. It did not transmit vibrations nearly as well as hard surfaces, so I could not feel people move about.

There was an evacuation plan next to the stairway’s door, showing the floor’s layout. Quite a complex one, by comparison. Four rows of small offices intersected by meeting and break rooms of various sizes. If not for the lack of dead-ends, I would have called it a maze. I saved a picture of it, just in case.

We were at the south emergency exit. Our corridor ought to lead to a break room, but the doors to access it were out of view. We would have to go around it. The doors on our sides led to restrooms and storage areas.

Alban was already aiming down of hall. Lena went to his side and, without a word, they each picked their side of the two paths leading around the break room.

“We’ve got incoming,” I heard Melwenn half-whisper behind me. I turned to see him close the door.

He crouched and took his bag off. From it, he retrieved a metallic contraption which looked like a ring with small bars coming out. Melwenn set the device around the handle of the stairway’s door and extended its appendages, effectively blocking the path.

Once that was done, he looked at Alban. “Alright,” he said, still speaking at a low volume, “we’re not giving a weapon to Five, whatever, but it can still carry the jammer, right?”

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Without turning back or changing where he aimed his rifle, Alban lowered himself.

Clang!

The sound came from afar, but it made it clear to me we were not alone on this floor.

I looked at Melwenn for directions. He was aiming at the intersection as well, no doubt in reaction to the noise. He took a hand off his rifle to point at Alban’s backpack once he noticed me.

Guessing what he meant, I went and opened Alban’s bag. There were other devices in there, but the jammer was the most prominent one. I took it out.

The weight was within what I could handle, though the system gave me a warning about the increased energy consumption. With a thought, I checked the battery levels. I still had enough to last a couple of days, even if I kept carrying this around.

Alban got back up before I had a chance to close his bag. Thankfully, nothing threatened to fall off.

“Turn it on if we get in a fight,” Melwenn whispered.

I looked at him and nodded my understanding.

CHUCK!

Someone was trying to open the stairway’s door.

CHUCK! CHUCK!

“Alright, time to go.”

I advanced with the group, taking the left path around the break room. This time, Melwenn was the one guarding our rear.

We found ourselves in another corridor. On the right, a long wall with two doors, one at each extremity. According to the floor plan, they would grant access to the break room. Both were closed at the moment. On the other side were a dozen open doors, which I knew to be offices. All of them were ajar. The door at the end of the path would lead to a meeting room. Here also, we would have to go around it to continue, though this time we could only do so by the right. I did not feel safe, being unable to see where the path beyond led as the break room obscured it.

Alban went to inspect the closest open door, while Lena monitored the end of the path. He paused before entering, made a strange sign, and looked back at us. He and Lena swapped roles as she went to explore the opposite room. She made the same sign, and they kept going. What did it mean?

As I dutifully followed them, it did not take long for me to glimpse what they were seeing in those offices.

I was disappointed to find only a couple of desks, one of them empty, the other full of little trinkets. Those had been pushed away as their owner decided to take a nap. There was a nameplate. “Melor Guillevic, Bioengineer”. He must also have tipped over his drink as he fell asleep, because a dark red liquid stained all his documents, even reaching the sides of his desk.

There was something wrong about it... Oh.

“He’s dead!” I exclaimed. “T-they’re killing people!”

Alban, Lena, and Melwenn reacted instantly. They all went into the room closest to them, leaving me alone in the hallway as I still processed the implications.

“You said there would be a judgment!” I accused Melwenn. “They’re not even arresting them, they’re just murdering everybody!”

None of the aliens seemed to react. They were all too focused on playing with their stupid rifles.

“They’re going to kill Master too, aren’t they?! You’ve got to-“

Thump!

That came from down the hall.

I turned to look at what had made the noise. There was now someone lying on their belly in front of the meeting room’s door. A local, according to the body shape. They wore an all-covering armor, painted in black. Their helmet had fallen down and now rested on top of a gooey mess. It took me a few seconds to realize that, given the fur mixed in, that substance had to be the remains of their head. The sight put a stop to my frantic rambling, smothering it through numb shock.

Did people really die this fast? This frivolously? Could we not have tried to talk them out of it? Just paralyze them in some way? Why did they all go straight to the most irremediable of approaches?

Noise coming from down the hall brought me back. The enemy?! I had to hide! I had to-

“Jammer,” Lena said, voice low and without the tension I felt the situation deserved.

Oh. Right. I looked at the device in my hands and replicated the turn on sequence I had seen Alban perform. It lit up, confirming my success.

“Where do I go?” I asked her.

“Three! Right! Five! Lena, you’re up,” Melwenn answered. Or possibly ordered, because Lena and Alban reacted. They moved out of their rooms and went down the corridor, reaching the door of the meeting room. I started to follow, but stopped as I saw them fall back.

I heard the sound of a rapid fire weapon, accompanied by that of the offices’ walls and doors being pierced by its bullets.

W-what?

Thankfully, I was far too far back to have been hit. My kidnapping protectors had reacted much more swiftly, dropping to the ground to avoid it all.

Unless... Unless they had not been quick enough? Had they just died? It all happened so fast.

But no, Melwenn and Alban rolled sideways, aiming their weapons to shoot down the corner. Their target was beyond my sight. Lena must have been fine too, because she got up to a crouched position. Leaving her weapon unattended, she opened her backpack and took out a few colored, hand-sized spheres. She attached some to her rifle, and others to her armor.

Without warning, Lena made a white ball roll to me.

A grenade?!

I let got of the jammer and promptly backed away.

It… did not explode.

Lena was standing back up, her bag now closed and rifle in hand. She looked at me. “Take it and follow.”

I fetched the new device. “What about the jammer?”

“Leave it.”

As I got closer to her, Lena detached another white ball from her rifle, pushed a button, then tossed it toward where the others were shooting.

Melwenn and Alban reacted at the sight of the apparatus going past them. They stood up and dashed to the meeting room’s wall. I followed their gaze, trying to figure out why they were looking toward the offices’ side and not at the corner from which the bullets had come.

And then, for the first time since I had started using it, my body’s peripherals malfunctioned. The vision feed became pure white.

Wait, did I not have two cameras? Both failing at exactly the same time was more than unlikely. I could still hear footsteps. People were running. I thought it might have been my escort, given the sounds’ origin.

Sight abruptly returned, as if nothing had happened.

From my position, I could only see Lena. She was now at the edge of the intersection, shooting frantically. The others must have gone past her already.

“Go! Go! Go!” I heard Melwenn said.

Lena lowered her rifle, looked back at me, then dashed forward.

I followed as fast as I could.

Reaching the junction let me see the corridor from which the enemy had been firing. It was not pretty. Our half of it was covered in thick bullet holes, the floor blanketed in debris coming from the walls and doors. The other half was even less inviting. Oh, there were no holes there, and everything above half a meter from the ground was intact. Below that, though, I saw pieces of armor, weapons, naked bones, bits of fur, and goo. These people had not been wearing full armor, and their liquefied organs, muscles, and tissues had escaped through whatever holes they could find. Just how many lives had ended today? And for what?

“Alright, our exit’s the fifth door on the left,” Melwenn reminded his companions. “Lena? We’re not taking any chances. You go ahead and use the blockers.”

Lena obeyed Melwenn’s order by activating and tossing another spherical device. A black one, this time. I watched it land and roll, going near the end of the new corridor. Once stabilized, it shed its outer shell, revealing a dark, spongy-textured orb that started to expand.

Lena threw another one behind me.

“Those things cost a fortune...” Melwenn said. “Well, we weren’t supposed to face some secret police force or whatever this is. We’ll just have to ask the client for a bonus.”

I joined with the group, not wishing to get entangled in the thing Lena had just unleashed. As the spheres’ size reached the ceiling, their growth slowed down. We were completely locked in.

Melwenn walked down to the office door he had mentioned, opened it, and went through.

BANG!

“Fuck!” Lena exclaimed, turning to shoot at something behind me.

BANG! BANG!

I turned to see what she was shooting at, but the fight was already over. A body fell down from a half-opened door, slowly transforming into goo. The black uniform confirmed it had been one of the intruders. Well, one of the evil ones. Did my kidnappers count as good? No, probably not. One of the people trying to kill me, then.

I heard a door slam as Melwenn came rushing back. “What happened?!”

“Ambush.” Lena pointed at Alban. “He’s hit!”

Alban was lying on the ground, unmoving. His rifle was next to him, but his bag had been blown away.

“Oh, fucking damn it!” Melwenn dashed to inspect the wound. “Shit, that pierced right through.”

Lena and I came closer. There was a hand-sized hole in the middle of Alban’s armor. A mess of dark red bits had stained the floor beyond where he laid. Just how bad was it? I could see his heart, and it was still beating. We had to bring him to the hospital as soon as possible!

I did not know where the infirmary was. Why did I not? That could have helped Master, surely.

“There’s a medical bed in my lab,” I pointed out.

They were not listening. Melwenn got something out of his bag and applied it to Alban’s neck. Oh, of course, they had some device to heal him! Great!

The wound was not closing.

“It doesn’t seem to be working,” I said. “Maybe he needs more?”

The heart finally stopped beating.

“My fault,” Lena said. I had hitherto heard little emotion from her, but this time she had let it reach her voice.

“No,” Melwenn told her, sounding hoarse, “I should not have rushed ahead.”

Lena got another device from her bag and gave it to Melwenn.

He took it. “Give me a minute, will you? Just go unlock the tunnel with Five. I’ll be fine. I doubt there’s any more of them hiding.”

Lena nodded and headed for one of the offices. She did not look back at me to see if I was following.

I stayed a few seconds longer, some part of me unwilling to leave Alban’s body. It felt like he was not really gone as long as we were here.

Bang! Bang!

Terror filled me. Were we getting shot again? But no, Melwenn had not reacted, and it was a considerably softer noise than earlier. The out-of-beat banging intensified in volume as I got closer to the office Lena was in.

Entering revealed its source. She was using the butt of her rifle to hit the wall, having already made a few holes that looked to be much deeper than they ought to be.

The design and furniture for this office was the same as the one I had previously visited. However, this one had not been attributed to anyone, and so there was a distinct lack of dead bodies.

Lena did not acknowledge my presence, continuing to destroy the wall. I thought I heard her muttering, but did not raise my microphones’ levels to catch it. She had just lost someone. Those words were not meant for me.

I stood in silence as her efforts slowly revealed a passage. Now that the tension was gone, my mind was falling in a daze. It pointed out that I may inadvertently have caused Alban’s death by being too loud with my stupid complaints.

Melwenn joined us shortly after, and we went through, not speaking a word.

The tunnel led to a rope. Lena tied me up securely, then they climbed up before pulling me out.

I was no longer paying attention. Images of the horrors I had just witnessed tormenting my thoughts.

We found ourselves in a dark alley, leaving it to find a truck parked nearby. Lena and I went in the back, sitting among a collection of crates.

We drove off.

I had a throbbing headache. Not a pain I was used to. There was nothing showing up on the Behavior Monitor, meaning it had not caused it. A glance at the logs told me the Health Monitor had detected the anomaly, but did not have any recommendations.

“I have a headache,” I informed Lena.

She did not react. She had been fixated on a corner of the truck, lost in her thoughts. Perhaps she was also reliving those moments, no doubt more focused on Alban and what she could have done to save him. Compared to that, I deemed my issues not worth mentioning any further.

After about an hour, we still had not uttered a word, both taken by torpor. My headache had grown disruptive, slowing my thoughts down to a slog. Guilt had started covering the felling of horror. Could I have done better? Did I fail them in some way? Was I failing them right now? Lena did not seem to be doing well. Maybe I ought to try comforting her. Had Master ever shown me what to say in this kind of situation? I tried to recall. How strange, I seemed to remember an incident where-

Broadcast message from healthmon@arti5 (232-4299-7817):

Neural pathway degeneration detected. The system is going down for suspend NOW!