My hand melted outwards to touch the dilapidated helicopter. The liquid metal coating the left side of the vehicle. I let it sit in place for several minutes, only pulling my hand away after the pile of material my leg was melted into completely dissolved.

Removing my hand and reforming it unveiled a large section of the helicopter, the spot I had touched now fully repaired and functional.

I let out a sigh of satisfaction, it never got old.

Kassidy called them nanites, microscopic robots that combined to form my whole. The woman had been very insistent in my utilization of them; by uploading various machine plans into my computer banks, I had been able to repair large swaths of the helicopter with ease.

The old machine was now almost fully functional, the parts of the titan behemoths serving as new bones for the ancient dragon.

“Cee! Hank sent us more stuff!” Paris shouted from far behind me, the little girl having exited the foyer area of the bunker. The upper level of which was now fully repaired and cleaned.

“I’ll be over in a second!” I called back to her with a wave.

The little girl smiled and ran back inside.

I turned to the far end of the canyon, looking towards several dozen unmarked graves that I had personally dug into the earth. The disturbed land held onto the corpses of all who had died inside the bunker, my first act after returning here.

Sending a silent prayer in their direction, I turned away. After taking a moment to make sure all my nanites had returned, I walked up towards the bunker.

It was an odd feeling, my body dissolving, that is. Kassidy had speculated that the reason I couldn’t control them before was because of my weak ‘sense of self’, whatever that meant. For me, I didn’t know why I had suddenly been able to control them.

All I knew for sure was that the action wasn’t very comfortable, the dissolution of my solid form always making me uneasy.

After I had killed the titans and returned to my form, I felt extremely drained, my power reserves had been emptied in seconds. It meant I couldn’t spend all day melted into goop, which was fine with me... despite Kassidy’s endless pleas.

I stomped my feet to free loose dirt and sand as I reached the door to the bunker. My boots had long ago been torn away. I felt oddly naked without them.

Pushing the door open I stepped inside.

The entire room had been rebuilt and remodeled, furniture and other amenities now set up to make an open floor home. Bunk beds in one corner, with a living room and kitchen in another.

We decided to keep the bathrooms outside.

I didn’t see the sense into putting so much work into the place if it was only a short term set-up, but Kassidy and the kids thought otherwise.

The children talked and played off to the side of a stack of plastic crates, several dozen boxes in total.

Kassidy had been using Hank to package supplies for us, then having her own contact drop it off nearby. The woman drove out often to retrieve them, careful to hide her presence.

Today it seemed we got another delivery; I hadn’t been expecting one today.

“What did we get?” I asked, stepping into the light.

“Kassidy said we had to wait for you to look!” Paris called out, the little girl holding Tom in a headlock.

“You okay Tom?” I asked the boy.

“Yeugh.” Was his struggled response.

He seemed fine.

I walked over to the pile of boxes.

Kassidy sat atop the crates, a foam bat in hand.

“These brats keep trying to crack them open without you,” She said with a pointed glare at Leo, the little boy slowly backing away, “I’ve been keeping them at bay.”

The woman bonked me on the head with the foam stick.

“Nice,” I replied, ignoring her hit, “What’s the big deal though? I didn’t know we had a package scheduled today.?”

Kassidy hopped down from the boxes, tossing the foam bat to the side.

“Yeah, but that was the point.”, She said with a sly grin, “Most of it is just more supplies for the helicopter and the downstairs.”

Kassidy tugged on a single large crate; the color different from the others.

“This one,” She grunted in exertion, “Is a special gift from Hank and I.”

I walked over to the box, placing my hand on the lid.

“So do we open it?” I asked her, curious about the contents.

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“Yeah, just give me a second.” She replied.

The woman looked past me and called out, “Kids! We're opening ‘em!”

Squeals of excitement rang out, the children racing to be the first over.

“No! No! Back! Back!” Kassidy cried, holding the children back, frantically looking for her foam bat.

I let out a laugh and turned to the box.

Reaching around it, I flicked the latches open, the lid popping upwards with ease.

The kids quieted as I shoved the lid off the rest of the way, the top clattering to the ground.

“Well look at that.” I said surprised, grinning wide to myself.

Inside the box sat a flatscreen tv, several dozen pounds of candy, and a USB-stick labeled ‘movies’.

That night we stayed up all night watching movie after movie, the animated comedies being the kid’s favorites. When morning broke the next day, I turned to find only a single person still awake with me, Ant.

His eye’s drooped and fluttered, but he forced himself to stay conscious. I let out a soft chuckle and scooped the boy up, placing him in his bed, despite his weak protests.

I then proceeded to place the other kids into their respective bunks, tucking each of them in.

Kassidy laid upside down across the sofa, her mouth drooling onto the floor.

I let out a long sigh and picked her up into my arms, carrying her to her bed and pulling the blanket over her. The woman stayed completely unconscious the whole time, her rumbling snores proving as much.

With everyone asleep I took the chance to go outside, the morning light barely lighting the sky. I found a nice rock and sat upon it, gazing upwards into the fading stars.

The same stars sat above me now as the ones I saw so long ago now.

I sat with them until the sun pushed them away, every single one turning invisible to me.

My feet sunk into the sand as I stood to my feet, small indents left in my wake as I walked back to the bunker.

Inside, Kassidy cooked instant eggs in an industrial microwave for the kids. Their eyes puffy and swollen from lack of sleep. Walking past them I entered the now repaired elevator, dropping down to the lower level.

The elevator had been difficult to fix, but Kassidy had been insistent on accessing the lower floor.

I had obliged.

The doors slid open for me to step out.

White lights ran along the hallway’s floors, leading to the vault that held my brethren.

I followed the lights to the room, various flood lights set up throughout the large cavern, illuminating it fully.

In total, there were some fifteen thousand other robots scattered about the facility. Each with a unique code written on their foreheads.

My foot stepped on a rusted metal plate, a soft crunch echoing through the chamber.

Looking under my foot, a metal hand sat outstretched, the main body of the machine buried under a pile of rubble.

I got to work.

In addition to my work on the helicopter, I used some of my time to clean and organize the large vault. I made it my duty to return each robot to its proper cell, cleaning the glass and rubble out of the room as I did so.

Kassidy didn’t think it possible for any other machine down here to ‘wake-up’, claiming my experience to be a one in a quadrillion event.

I didn’t much care, if I could be woken up, maybe I could wake up the others too.

Finishing up for the day, I touched the faded paint of another machine.

‘Y-22’

Using my nanites, I ate away the paint and replaced it with new markings.

A simple refresh of their name.

“Cee! Kassidy needs you to move some stuff!” A voice rang out from in my head, my hand snapping away as the sound startled me.

“Paris! I told you to message first, you can't just hop on my channel and start yelling!” I yelled back at the girl, my hand reforming as I scolded the girl.

“Sorry! I forgot you were a scaredy bot!” she mocked.

I shook my head in disappointment. I may have kept the girl alive so far, but I was starting to wonder if that was the right choice.

Bury her neck deep in sand, then let’s see how much smack she talks...

I entered the elevator and rose to the surface, a barrage of little pebbles pinging off me in greeting.

“Sweep these up when you’re done.” I told my attackers, the kids’ smiles faltering as I walked away unfazed.

I wasn’t sure why they expected it to scare me, they did it every time I came back up.

Making my way over to Kassidy I found her struggling to push a stack of machine parts outside.

“Why did you take them all out of their boxes in here?” I asked her, the original crates having wheels on them.

“Uh, uh, nope, I don’t need none of that!” She shot back, not taking the time to let me mock her.

“Okay... stupid.”

Kassidy just let out a hard snort and returned to her pile.

I joined her.

Pushing the items outside and to the helicopter was harder than it should have been, the pile falling over neigh constantly. ‘We’ had chosen the least efficient way to move the stack of boxes.

We finished moving the items and Kassidy collapsed onto her butt, sweat dripping off her brow.

“Little hot?” I asked, the vents on my side blowing out heat.

Kassidy just shot me a glare and started fanning herself.

I laughed and turned from the woman, looking at the helicopter, my fingers tracing a network of lines left by my repairs.

My mind wandered to the completed device.

“Where do you think we should go?” I asked.

The woman pushed herself to her feet and climbed to the side of the helicopter, leaning against the rusted frame.

She brushed some of the red dust into her hands before sprinkling it onto the airship.

“Neverland, if we could.” She said, her face contorted deep in thought.

“Where is that?” I asked, a strange name for a place.

Kassidy just lowered head and smiled, “I don’t know, maybe somewhere to the north? I can’t stand this constant heat, plus, I heard there are some plants still alive by the north pole.”

I nodded my head, imagining what that would be like, to see a plant in real life.

“I like that idea.” I replied.

Shifting my whole person into a puddle, I absorbed the machine parts and soaked myself into the helicopter, coating the whole vehicle.

Kassidy jumped back in a panic, “What the hell Cee?!”

I moved rapidly, ordering my body to construct the plan that I had laid out in my mind.

I felt as metal was broken away and replaced, the nanites repairing and altering the helicopter on a more fundamental level.

As I grew sleepy and nauseous, I completed the work, falling off the vehicle in a wet slurry, slowly reforming myself into my person.

“Wow...” Kassidy muttered from besides me.

In front of us sat a fully restored weapon of war, the white titanium of the titans giving it a silver glow.

Powered by three nuclear cores, the ship would never have to land. The inside had been transformed into a spacious and clean opening, the previously rusted core replaced with polished polyester seats and panels. Weapons stolen from the behemoths shone brightly, embedded in the machine.

“I think she is just about ready.” I said, my constant grin finally reflecting my true mood.

We spent that night watching movies again, this time I wore an aluminum crown. The kids having decided to make the piece of regalia to celebrate the creation of our new ‘Gryphon’.

The night proceeded like much the last, with me being the last awake, tip-toeing around to put everyone in their beds.

I picked Paris up last this time, the little girl having been passed out under the coffee table, small pieces of candy and chips stuck to her face.

Paris’s eyes opened groggily as I tucked her in, a few quite words escaping her lips.

“I love you, Cee.”

I pressed my forehead against my daughter’s, responding in kind.

“I love you to Paris.”