34 hours and 40 minutes remaining.
It turns out that madly running for their lives was really messing up ZM-11833’s precise timing. Frantic feet pounded concrete as they hauled their fetching foxy forms through the rising floors, all the while more dastardly fashion bots flowed their way towards them like violent dancers.
Many of the doll-like robots were earlier models than the dreamy ZM-11833 and didn’t have their vast fortitude. Some were the same ideal model as them and thus had the same amazonian purity to them. Polymer bodies resistant to all forms of damage, high quality durable lightweight titanium bones and a comprehensive suite of sensors.
So it wouldn’t be easy to escape them as ZM-11833 found out the hard way.
A majestic bot bearing ZM-11833’s breathtaking face gilded forward. A dapper deep red form-fitted corporate suit armored the body that slammed into our ZM-11833. Heavy stylish limbs grappled onto their body bearing both desirable bots to the ground.
The wanted ZM-11833 found their head being repeatedly thrust into the cold concrete face-plate first, instead of their face-plate it was the concrete that cracked and splintered. In turn ZM-11833 attempted to tear the stunning bots joints apart to get free.
While they were quite able to free themselves despite being forcefully introduced to the floor, it was made all the more straightforward when Anaya drove a length of dense metal though its spine along an exposed joint.
ZM-11833 threw it off their artful body and tore the offending bot marvelous limb from marvelous limb.
Lively wild eyes met with mesmerized sensors. Just who was the hero in this story?
More and more fabulously dressed fashion bots were in hot pursuit of the deepening couple and were most likely lying in wait up ahead. ZM-11833 felt that they could take any of the less impressive earlier models but also felt that the models like their statuesque self would be fairly difficult opponents.
But they needed to move, time stops for no man or for fantastic fashion in this case.
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Echoing sporadic gunfire erupted on floor 384 as if a war had broken out. Upon reaching this hellish level teeming with psychotic war-bots the faithful companions had raided a lone gun store near the entrance to the floor.
They marched a steady tune across the floor with their weighty, durable and glossy boots, interspersed occasionally with notes of high pitched gunfire. The primal playful music flowed directly into the figure-friendly everyday wear that charged them.
Guided by their targeting suite, which was definitely only designed for spotting fashion trends, ZM-11833 accurately shot the mini-dress wearing models. Electric blue sparks flew from punctured heads, bathing the floor in a macabre light-show.
What annoyed ZM-11833 the most wasn’t being attacked by arguably their siblings, no it was that Anaya was that better shot. Anaya was apparently able to shoot out their optical sensors and effectively blind them. This was despite the evasive maneuvers the attractive and highly sophisticated fashion bots tried to perform.
It was extraordinarily impressive, not that ZM-11833 would actually tell them.
ZM-11833 was self-conscious enough not to accuse them of cheating while they fought for their fragile lives.
In fact while they were perilously close to dying it would be a bad time to bring up past issues.
“I was right! You are a war-bot!” Anaya inappropriately crowed triumphantly as she continued to pick off more enchanting bots.
“Is now the time~” ZM-11833 did still want to participate in combat banter, they had seen that in the movies all the dreamy heroes bantered with their kiss-able sidekicks.
“Do you have somewhere better to be?”
“No~” Amazing banter like this.
The contoured forms of the advanced bots had slunk off to the sides, they had eventually learnt to avoid the dead-eyed upbeat human that was picking them off. ZM-11833 did hear the loud sounds of reckless machines tearing through solid concrete walls in order to flank them.
Hmm~ was it time for the grenades?
Under their arm was a designer faux leather purse that was comfortable to carry without compromising on their fashion trend. Also it was absolutely budging with electronically controlled high explosives.
ZM-11833 set them all to detonate in 6 seconds then threw the easy to maintain and fabulous purse into the restaurant that they had heard the clumsy machines bumbling around in. Turning around they picked up their sweet smelling angel and began hauling their pert ass to safety.
“Wait?! Did you set them all off?!” Anaya’s panicky scream rebounded inside of ZM-11833‘s casing. She really should know the answer by now.
Everything got utterly quiet for a brief moment as the all gun-smoked air was sucked from the atmosphere towards a single point before an absolutely deafening explosion rocked the floor. The quaking eruption sent the hostile bots tumbling down onto the crumbling floor below in charred bits and pieces.
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Cool delicate polymer hands removed themselves from warm sensuous human ears as the explosion ceased. Soft to the touch messy fiery red hair followed through their white fingers as they stroked an irate human.
“Heheehe~” A robotic giggle of purest joy echoed out as ZM-11833 faced down the complete overpowering wrath of a furious friend, the shaking swats didn’t affect them in the slightest but they did eventually let the immensely huggable Anaya down from their polymer arms in order to walk on her own.
They picked their up cracked stairs and along a now destroyed level that had been above the explosion. Rubble and glass cracked and crunched under foot as they made their way higher.
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A drained and sweaty Anaya slumped desperately onto a nearby bench after her fawn-like legs began to fail her, left absolutely shaking from the brisk rush they had taken to get here.
The pair had made a mad dash all the way to floor 386 fighting through more hordes of machines, expending as much ammo as they could to fend off the lace wearing bots.
She hurriedly uncapped her bottle of cool water and poured it down her parched throat, ZM-11833 sat off to her side idly opening the crinkly packets of dried flavorless rations they had packed before leaving.
The fearless pair had been ascending the archology for almost 15 hours straight by now, give or take the times they had stopped for much needed clothing shopping or when Anaya had been carried by a fast-paced and well-dressed fashion bot.
While glancing about for more insane but gorgeous bots, ZM-11833 thought about the beeping that signaled her requirement to change outfits. Even now it was counting down. Did it have something to do with the insanity possessing the machines?
If it did, ZM-11833 would have to keep on top of it; they had taken 11 hours before they had changed outfits. First last night and the other just before the robots went insane.
The beeping must have reached zero for them just after the point they got another outfit. If they wanted to keep sane they’d need to change at least 3 more times before the top. It wasn’t really a problem for the fashionista, they’d always take the opportunity to find a cute dress.
It was more a problem for Anaya than anything, if ZM-11833 went mad. ZM-11833 didn’t want to think about that really.
They peeked over at the fiery human who had taken to eating from ZM-11833 polymer fingers as her own had betrayed her, still sore from all the shooting she had done.
She was waning even with the breaks.
There were other options besides just carrying her up, which with the murderous robots abound would be a bad idea. Another option was a chemical one. Many companies within the archology sold energy drinks and pills of varying degrees of effectiveness.
While Anaya shuffled off to a nearby bathroom ZM-11833 searched around a local pharmacy and plundered it for a bottle of EverAwake pills and a couple of cans of HeartBurster energy drinks. These two had the highest effectiveness to heart attack ratios, they did grab a couple of adrenaline pens just in case.
“Here drink this and take two of these pills~” ZM-11833 gently coerced a tiredly struggling Anaya to drink and swallow the wake up supplements. She’d crash in 48 hours but she’d either be gone or dead by that point. Not that she’d make it off as ZM-11833 had lied about it after all.
ZM-11833 watched as the shorter girl’s pupils dilated wide and she began vibrating on the spot.
“Lets go~” ZM-11833 jogged to catch up with the now swiftly moving human.
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By the time the athletic duo had made their way to floor 391 the hyper overstimulated Anaya had finally calmed down from her initial high. Although she was still plenty pissed off about it despite it making her rush blazingly past aggressive bots and gunning them down like some sort of furious action movie heroine.
“Don’t just feed me drugs randomly!” Once again she was yelling at poor ZM-11833.
“They aren’t technically drugs, they are listed as work supplements on corporation regulations and thus are not subject to drug taxes.'' Was it clever or immoral? “Plus it wasn’t random either, I made a highly intelligent choice to optimize our energy levels and time it would take to reach the top.”
“Well…Ask first!”
“Noted~” ZM-11833 was having fun bantering with an excitable Anaya.
Bright lights interrupted their playful banter, they flashed into a brilliant existence and just like before, they blinded a powerless Anaya.
“MOTHER FUCKER!” Anaya clutched at her tearful green eyes, a wise ZM-11833 had been fast enough to adjust their sensors this time.
“HOLD IT RIGHT THERE CRIMINAL SCUM!!” The shouty corpo-police officer was back and somehow even more furious than before.
“You were ordered to remain in place! Not only have you failed to comply with corporation security orders but you have instead damaged numerous private Tawaga affiliated machines, robbed several stores and blew a hole in an entire floor which will cost the company millions in damages!”
Really Anaya?! You did all that?
“FUCK YOU!” Anaya was really mad now. “These bots went insane themselves and attacked us!”
“A likely story! Now if you won’t come quietly I have to use force!” The corpo-police officer was shouting some strange things at them now.
How was he going to use his supposed force if he wasn’t even here? The corporate security station was all the way up on floor 400, ZM-11833 could take on anything this corpo-pig could throw at them!
“Unit ZM-11833 activation codes Patriot Desire Nimble Ace 45553009!”
Uh oh. That didn’t sound good.
ZM-11833 warily eyed the newly activated codes deep in their memory banks; they had never noticed them there before. It was slowly spreading through their/her/his mind/CPU and was making everything feel funny/strange.
The corruption flowed into their codes and begun modifying them, resetting them to a prior iteration.
Their vision/sensors started to bleed into a bright red.
ZM-11833 stopped before an enemy combatant that was nearby and began deploying their anti-infantry measures. Ultra-sharp titanium blades sprouted from hard polymer fingers as they stalked closer to the unmoving target.
“Target Acquired”
“Uhh Zee?” The target spoke towards the unit.
“Don’t do this Zee! I’m your friend Anaya!” It spoke again.
Razor sharp claws rose high above the target which fell to the floor in fright.
“Zee! Don’t!”
The claws fell.