It took me two and a half hours to unbury the truck from the sand dune it had gotten wedged in. After removing ourselves from that particular predicament I decided that it was for the best that I drove from then on. Paris thought it was unfair.

Frankly? I didn’t care.

“I said I was sorry!”, Paris protested in the seat beside me, “How was I supposed to know that it couldn’t jump it!”

“Tell that to my joints,” I muttered, “they’re still full of sand.”

While I was perfectly capable of cleaning sand out of myself, that didn’t mean the process felt very nice.

The car ride from then on had gone fairly smoothly. While the town didn’t have a real road connecting it to the rest of civilization, we were able to find a worn-down path of packed dirt and sand leading away from it. Unable to spot any other traversable path, we decided to go down it. The path ending up snaking back and forth in the general direction of Las Vegas, at least if Paris’s directions could be trusted.

After settling down from her joy ride, Paris seemed to enjoy watching the landscape fly past, as mundane as it was. The dunes disappearing off into the horizon or merging with distant mountain ranges. She kept the windows down as much as she dared, eventually closing them when the sand flying into her face became too much for her to bear.

For my part, I thought the drive was rather dull.

The truck continued to fly down the path, kicking up a trail as it did so. The reworked machine making easy work of the desert road.

It wasn’t until we had been driving for about another hour or so that we made it to the end of the little path. Before us stood a cracked pavement highway extending off into the distance, it seemed maintained, but only to the bare minimum.

The highway was void of any other vehicles, that is, if you didn’t count the burnt-out frames of long destroyed cars.

“Which way is Las Vegas?”, Paris asked me, her gaze shifting left and right, looking off into the distance.

“I'm not sure.” I responded, “Can you pass me the map?”

Paris handed me the map; she had been using it as a sunshield. Orienting it and using the little information I had, I made my best guess at which highway we found ourselves facing.

If I had picked the right road, it seemed to lead straight to our destination, if we took a right that is. I folded the map back up and pulled us onto the highway.

“We should be able to just go this way,” I pointed to the right, “And it should lead us right to Vegas.”

Paris looked off down in the direction I had pointed to, squinting her eyes in an attempt to see the city.

She had no such luck.

“How far away is it?” Paris asked me.

It was hard to gauge the distance we had to go on the map, considering that our location itself was just my best guess.

“If I had to make a guess,” I said, seeing how guessing has been my go-to lately, “I would say it's about another few hours. Though it could be more or less, depending on the state of the road that is.”

While it didn’t look like we were going to hit any major traffic out here, the state of the road itself was cause for concern. While traversable, the road held countless potholes and debris to hinder our journey.

“Okay. If you get tired just let me know and I will drive so you can sleep.” The little girl responded, a cheeky smirk on her face.

“Not happening.” I shot back.

And with that, I slammed my foot into the accelerator, beginning our ride down to Vegas.

----------------------------------------

Jane leaned back in her chair, throwing her feet up on the dark wooden desk that sat before her. She pressed a cigarette to her lips, drawing in a lungful of smoke. She gazed out the glass wall, the view from her office overlooking the entirety of Las Vegas. She released her breath, the smoke trailing up to the ceiling. Her earpiece dinged, she tapped at it, a screen projecting itself into her vision.

It was a message from the head of her task force, Lieutenant Harrison.

“Seventeen occupants successfully extracted from site. One girl escaped with some sort of bot, however. I tried determining its model to track it, but our data banks don’t show anything like it. I know you don’t usually care about the stragglers, but I think you should watch this.”

After the message there was a video file, a capture from one of the men’s helmets.

Jane pushed play, the video’s audio relaying itself to cover over her own hearing.

“Place the children on the ground immediately!” The recorder of the video called out.

In front of him stood a humanoid bot with two children in its arms. The bot hesitated a moment then placed the children on the ground and stood back. It spoke relaying its purpose, ‘general care’, and model number ‘C-13’.

Pausing the video, Jane took a moment to think. She couldn’t recall hearing of that particular model series before, but with the number of bots made each year, she could hardly be blamed. She resumed the video.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

The bot proceeded to comply with the commands it was given, turning the children and itself over for ‘relocation’. The video shifted to the view of the soldier leading the bot, the machine now in its transport mode. The children being carried towards the back of the troop carrier.

What happened next though intrigued Jane very much.

The bot removed itself from transport mode and knocked the man leading it to the ground. The man righted himself just in time to see the bot knock into the men holding the children and grab one of them, proceeding to run off down a distant alley, all the while its frame deflected bullets off its back.

Jane paused the video, taking another draw of her cigarette, she thought.

The bot had faked its own transport protocol, it was capable of subterfuge. Not to mention that the machine’s physical prowess was leagues above normal combat-bot standards. Being able to move as quick as it did while still having the armor to deflect rifle rounds was impressive.

Jane resumed the video.

The clip jumped ahead, showing another perspective. This time Lieutenant Harrison’s was the camera’s host.

There was a loud crack and one of the men was marked in the lieutenant’s HUD as incapacitated. Lieutenant Harrison turned towards the noise, spotting the bot standing over his downed man, the machine shifting on its feet and racing towards the carrier’s ramp.

The lieutenant raised a bot stun gun, firing at the machine, dropping the rouge robot to the ground, the machine convulsing.

The video shifted once more to the take-off of the carrier, the ramp attempting to close as the previously incapacitated bot jumped onto it.

The bot was struck hard by one of the soldiers and knocked out of the ship, falling to the earth.

The video ended.

Jane closed the file, taking another deep lungful of smoke. Holding it in as long as she could, before slowly exhaling. She flicked the cigarette into an ashtray before moving to rub at her eyes.

She thought to herself, It’s too late for this... Dammit.

Jane looked back at the message from the lieutenant, silently weighing her options.

Deciding, she tapped at the screen, replying to the man.

“Don’t be sloppy next time. I want you to find that bot, you were right, I am interested.”

Jane hit send, the message shooting off to the lieutenant.

Jane closed the screen, pulling out a new cigarette, her small flame producing itself from her finger to light it. Combat-bots as capable as the one she just witnessed were very hard to come by, it was worth finding.

----------------------------------------

Blackness was all Martyn knew, the darkness all encompassing, wrapping him like a blanket...

It was peaceful....

He was jolted to life.

“I’ve got a heartbeat!”, A voice shouted out, “Come on buddy! Hang on, we got you!”

Martyn knew that voice, it was Kent, his crew’s doctor, the former medical chief of the prison. Martyn turned to look at him, his vision blurry and swirling.

“This is gonna hurt chief! Sorry, not sorry!”

Martyn tilted his head in confusion.

Before he could process the words, Martyn’s world exploded in pain as hundreds of thousands of little wires dug into his skull, piercing through his brain matter. Miniscule wires burning away sections of damaged tissue and replacing them with new metallic connections, closing all the gaps they could find.

Martyn started to seize, his mouth foaming and his blood vessels bursting under the pressure.

Martyn blacked out, reaching out to be embraced by the darkness once again...

Light streamed through the makeshift hospital room’s windows, the sun coming to rest on Martyn’s face. He sputtered to life, looking around at the various medical implements attached to him. He threw his head back and muttered to himself.

“Shit.”

----------------------------------------

We had driven the wrong way for the past two hours; Paris was very upset.

“You are a freakin’ robot! Just use GPS or something!”

“Listen here flesh-bag,” I shot back jokingly, “At least I didn’t wreck the truck within the first five seconds of me driving it.”

Paris held a hand to her chest in faux offense, “I never did such a thing!”

“Don’t you try gaslighting me little girl,” I threw back, “The sand stuck in my vents beg to differ.”

In all honesty, the sand had all been cleared out long ago, but she didn’t need to know that.

“Whatever,” she muttered in response, turning to rest her head against the windowsill, watching the sun set.

After our change of direction, we had lost quite a bit of time. While there was only one other direction we could go, I took extra precautions to make sure we were going the right way.

I may or may not have been a little embarrassed.

As I cruised down the highway, I spotted a plethora of broken-down vehicles, some so long rusted that it was hard to tell what they once were, old and forgotten by time. It made me think back to the dream I had not long ago, the flaming car flying past me, my sister’s voice telling my father goodbye.

I tried to picture her face; no image came to me.

I leaned back in my seat, releasing a mechanical sigh. I didn’t understand what I was. Originally it didn’t concern me, suddenly I was alive, I was fine with that. Now though, I was curious. Random thoughts flying through my mind, small memories showing up at strange times.

It hurt my head to think about.

I glanced over at Paris, the sun having long set. She was asleep, the map now acting as a makeshift blanket.

I opened the window to the truck’s bed with one arm and pulled a blanket out of one of the boxes, laying it out over her. She grabbed the blanket's edge and pulled it close, rubbing the hem against her face.

She was cute when she wasn’t being a little brat.

I looked back at the road, the highway stretching off into the night, the stars filling the sky, trying their best to distract me. It would be a long drive...

It wasn’t actually that long of a drive.

After driving an hour or two further, in the correct direction this time, I spotted them.

Thousands of little lights expanding over the horizon, their presence backlit by large colorful beacons shooting up into the sky. The lights danced across my vision; a human made star-scape. I stopped the truck.

Paris stirred, the sudden stop waking her, she rubbed at her eyes, “Are we there?”

I turned to her, breaking my gaze from the city, “Almost, look and see.”

Paris sat up, looking forward. Her face was suddenly lit up with hundreds of colors, the lights of the city bouncing off her hazel eyes. A smile grew on her face, a look of awe accompanying it. She mouthed a word, her lips forming the simple exclamation.

“Wow”

I turned back to the city’s lights, the entire city laid out before us. The lights framed towering skyscrapers, racing streets, luxurious hotels and casinos. While I couldn’t mouth the word same as her, I agreed, Wow.

We sat there for a while longer, just enjoying the view. A momentary reprieve from all the bad we had seen, from the task we still had to complete.

Paris turned to me, a single tear falling down her cheek, “I wish Tom was here to see this.”

I looked down at her, the little girl with a broken heart.

“Well, then I guess we will have to bring him back here and show him after we find him, won’t we?”

Paris looked back towards the city’s lights, “Yeah, we should.”

I placed my hand on top of her head, rubbing it, messing up her hair slightly in the process.

“You know what Paris?” I asked her.

She looked up at me, “What?”

“How about I teach you to drive?”

Her face lit up, “Really!”

“Sure, why not.” I chuckled, scooping her up and placing her on my lap, guiding her hands onto the steering wheel.

It took considerable effort to keep the little girl from running us off the road, but eventually she got the hang of it, making it to the city’s edge.

A line of spotlights lit the road, blocking our view of the immediate city, we pulled forward. The light’s beams passing over our heads, we looked forward.

A wall surrounded the city, a massive grey barricade, a small gap granting view into the city.

Neon lights shone.