Tiffany: ... about those spider bots. Ken?

Ken: About five hundred robots, each capable of killing several humans easily, far above the capabilities of any law enforcement I've heard of, incapable of being hacked by any normal or even extravagant means. I mean, I am pretty good...

He smirked at himself for a moment.

Ken: Fast enough to chase people down, are made of nanobots, hence making them impervious to most attacks, can turn into a much more dangerous version of themselves by merging, or should I say, amalgamating. I think that sums it up.

Tiffany: Thank you, Ken.

Max: Hey, hold on.

Tiffany: Hmmm?

Max: Does this kind of thing happen all the time?

Tiffany: Well.... no.

Ken: A few killer robots here, a few automated attack drones there, but never this.

Their screens showed an image from Ken's own recordings, showing the recorded footage of spider bots.

Ken: Nanobot hardware and software is incredibly hard to come by.

Max: Huh? How rare could it be?

Ken: Rare enough that most people still think it's science fiction.

Rose and Max: Woah!

Ken: To top it all off, there were five hundred of them. That means that whoever made them isn't only incredibly intelligent, but also....

The answer was apparent to all of them immediately.

There was a lot more where that came from.

Max: Sheesh.

Ken: Of course, luckily for us, we just so happened to have all the skills to survive such an encounter. Had we not been around, the entirety of Hypercity would have been destroyed, with no exceptions.

The mere stating of it made Rose, Max, and even Luke flinch.

Tiffany: Hold on, did you just say the entirety of Hypercity?

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Ken: Oh... yes. I'd almost completely forgotten. While I was unable to completely hack that monstrosity of computer coding, I was able to find this.

He showed a series of cryptic codes on the screen.

Max: What's that?

Ken: Allow me to decode it.

The encrypted code slowly unravelled, revealing a command. Search and Destroy.

Max: Huh?

Tiffany: Search and Destroy?

Ken: Please not the distinct lack of "X-corp" at the tail end of that statement.

Max: Huh?

Ken: Max, all machinery, big and small, all of them follow the instructions given to them without fail. Following every single order down to the letter. There is no way the creator could have been dumb enough to forget that.

A sudden realisation swept through all of them.

Tiffany: Are you sure you got the whole code?

Ken: Absolutely. After all, it chased after us when we tried to stop it, didn't it? It went so far as to avoid its "main objective" following us all the way out of town.

Max: That means....

Ken: Yes, that this robot's true intention was to destroy as much as it could, not to destroy "X-corp." A clever disguise, if I do say so myself.

Rose flinched. She wasn't keen on hearing about malevolent people.

Max: That's insane. Wait, but how did it end up destroying X-corp in the first place?

Ken: My best guess. Someone dropped it off there and released it at a time.

Tiffany: Tch.

Ken: As to who and when that was, I have no idea. I've been searching up footage from their security cameras for hours now. Nothing seems out of the ordinary. I've even looked at their previous weeks footage. Nothing seems out of the ordinary. And there weren't any security breaches of any kind. Of course, given this person's work so far, I probably shouldn't be surprised that I can't find evidence.

The complexity of the situation hit them. For Tiffany, Rose, and Luke, it was especially troubling. After all, they'd never seen something like this.

Luke: Whoever made these things is really something.

Tiffany: I see.

Rose: Oh dear....

Tiffany: Ken, what are your thoughts on this?

Ken: Hmm?

Tiffany: You're a tech whiz just like this guy. So, I'm guessing you have an idea of how this person thinks. So...

Ken: Honestly... I'm stumped.

Tiffany flinched.

Ken: Theres just so many questions. Why "X-corp?" Why "Hypercity?" Why go through so much work to decimate an entire city? Whoever planned this is a complete genius? I doubt the police will ever catch on. They would probably assume that the perpetrator was from a rival company like Y-corp or something. And also...

Tiffany: Yeah?

Ken: ... this threat may be almost as dangerous as Wolfram, if not more.

They all flinched at the statement, except Max.

Max: Yaaaaaaawn!

Tiffany: What!?

Luke: Huh?

Rose: Max?

Ken: Hmm?

He smirked and cockily started.

Max: So what if this jerk's got some suped up robots. We'll take them down all the same. Easy!

A silence covered the room for a moment as they were all in shock of what had been said before Ken started laughing.

Ken: Always full of surprises, huh Max.

Rose: (blushing) Oh... Max.

Luke shook his head in disbelief, but not disdainfully. How could he make light of something like that? But, in some way, it felt good to him say that. That he could somehow make light of what was coming for them.

Tiffany sighed.

Tiffany: (thinking: Oh boy....) Meeting adjourned, everyone. Get some rest.

And after a few good nights, the meeting was over.