Technological Syngularity

"Yeah, that's the best idea." Jake took off running down the lighted section of the corridor, wanting to outdistance that beast that was still in pursuit.

Dr. Ez nodded, but continued to look back at the strange flora. Shaking his head, he turned around and began moving the way that Jake had gone.

"Roz, you seriously alright?" Casey asked as he noticed the struggling. "We gotta get out of here. The gas isn't going to leak any slower, and the fire doesn't look too friendly. Come on, let me help." Casey started to walk over to Roz, reaching for the feet of Rook.

Nicholas jogged along behind the duo, coming up alongside Dr. Ez as they raced through the corridors.

"So... Any theories about what that stuff was back there?" he asked. "It looked a little... off... to me, though I'm certainly no biologist. Were the geneticists down here experimenting with more than just fauna?"

"Yes, some were working with flora... But not with vines that I know of... I only know of them working with tame flowers." Jake shook his head thinking of the mutant flora. He had never seen a test on plants, so he didn't know what was done to them. But he did know that there weren't any ones he was told about that had anything to do with vines. Were they doing it secretly? If so... why? Was it a dangerous test?

Dr. Ez glanced over his back, checking if the plant was somehow following them, because what Jake had said did not bode with him well at all.

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ROZ shook as some gears attempted to grind to a halt. "I... need help... This stuff it slowing me down..."

"Then where did those things come from...?" Nicholas muttered to himself.

He rounded a bend and saw what he hoped was an elevator shaft straight down the hall. "Hey, look! Is that what I think it is?"

The doors began to open with a hiss, and out stepped three drones.

"Crapcrapcrapcrapcrap!" Jake began back-pedalling as fast as he could once he saw the robots. "RUN!"

Dr. Ez needed no reminding, he turned around and began running full-tilt away from the elevator.

"Why are there monsters! Why are there always horrible, horrible monsters!"

Nicholas ran back after the others. "Do you think we could get away with ducking into an office?" He did not relish the thought of having to take the vine-covered path.

"Maybe! I don't know, I've never been down to this section!" Jake called to Nick. "Better than vines I bet!" He opened a door not far ahead, ushering the others inside. "Hurry, they may not see us, though I doubt it..."

Dr. Ez nodded and dashed inside. Immediately he began looking around the room for exits.

((ooohh man, sorry guys, I'll post))

Casey grabbed Rook and hauled her onto his shoulders. "Let's go," he grunted as he lumbered to A51, who had reached the stairs. Sweat quickly began to break out, and by the time Casey got to the stairs, he was about ready to collapse. He put down Rook, harder than he would've liked, and started to look for the problem.

"A51! Go see if you can find some tools," Casey ordered. In little time, A51 called back for Casey to come. Casey stood up and followed toward A51 After he had brought the tools back, he got to work on Rook.

((soon, dragockon. One more post, and you'll be up and running. By the way, what's the main problem in the system? overheat, or gas blockage?))

((Power leakage, and over heat. Some of the power 'cores' if you will over heated and shutdown causing problems every where else from lack of power. And thank you.)))

Nicholas lunged inside after Jake and Dr. Ez, pulling the door closed behind him.

He paused for a few seconds to listen... it appeared that, for the moment at least, they were safe from the drones.

Though it was quite dark in the room, Nicholas navigated his way to what he took for a janitor's closet. Inside, he found a sturdy wooden broom, and was able to detach the metal band that secured the many straw lengths.

"Used to play baseball with my dad," he said, almost to himself, as he gave the wooden rod a few practice swings.

Jake looked around for any other weapons that could do anything to the droids. A computer? No... A... What was that? Jake rushed over to one corner where he saw a small black thing, darker than the rest of the room which was already quite dark. Getting closer, he found that it looked to be a knife of some kind. Probably in a case though, so he would fortunately have somewhere to put it so he wasn't going to fall and cut his own throat, which would be an unfortunate circumstance.

Dr. Ez in the meantime was pushing as many things as he could to block the door. "I know that they will be able to just blast through this, but might as well do it if the Beasty came down as well. Suddenly thinking of it, he waited to see if there would be a sound of metal crushing, not remembering that SIDOS may have power over the creature. "C'mon beasty, crush 'em... You can do it..." he whispered as he continued barricading the door against everything outside.

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ROZ shuddered as the weight was taken off of him. He stood up once more, and began following after Casey. His systems had oddly begun adapting to this new source of air. His creator was definitely a genius. He began to stand straighter, and his outer features changed a bit to replicate what kind of environment he was in. On his shoulders were pipes that pumped out any toxic fumes he took in, and he had air in-takers right below them. His whole frame began shaking, and changes came upon him, readying his for hostile environments. He was specially created to survive in any environment, no matter what, and his systems were kicking in that special feature.

He caught up to Casey looking the same, but also different. The air in-takes and pumpers were this most noticeable, but his eyes had changed to be able to track the levels of poisonous air. Also his hands had slightly changed to become slight air purifiers. They wouldn't do much, but would help if the levels were too high even for him in his new state.

((Yay! You'll be coming back soon!))

Nicholas, seeing what Dr. Ez was up to, lent a hand. Together, the two men pushed a large desk in front of the door, before piling on the remainder of the room's furniture. The trio was left with a large, open space with papers and office supplies scattered about.

Unsure of how to proceed, Nicholas listened by the door for a few moments. He soon was able to make out footsteps.

"I think they're headed this way," he whispered. "This room got any other exits?"

"Uh... I don't know... I'll check." Jake raced from side to side, then he stopped and moved over to the janitor closet. "Maybe in here..." He felt around the wall, and sure enough, there was a code-pad to punch in the does to open the hidden door. "Any of you know the code for this thing?"

Dr. Ez shook his head and began searching for a different exit. Why would they need a code for a JANITOR? Unless there is something secret behind it of course...

"Oh, is this that one weird door? My buddy Jim in Genetics was always telling me about this one keypad dealie in his office that he could never quite fig-"

A resounding BOOM shook the room, knocking Nicholas off of his feet. The office door seemed to shudder, and several chairs were dislodged.

"Son of a..." He regained his footing and broomstick. "I could try to hack it, I guess! Unless we've got a way to get out of here quicker. That door won't hold very long."

"I don't see another exit yet... I'll keep checking, Jake, keep the barricade, and Nick, try to hack into it!" Dr. Ez continued to move around the darkened room.

Jake nodded and dashed towards the door. He began picking up what fell to the floor and replaced it. When he had to, he would lean against it as well to protect any more from falling to the ground. "Hurry! This thing is going down soon!" He continued to strain against the pile of office pieces.

"On it!"

Nicholas inserted his identification card into the panel slot and was met with a beep and a 'RESTRICTED' message.

"This is expected. I just have to bypass the clearance checker and it should accept my card..." He cracked open the panel with a whack from the broom and picked away at two blue wires. He swiped his card again.

Beeeeep 'RESTRICTED'

"Damn... guess SIDOS has access to this level's security. We - err, I - probably just alerted more drones." He tore the panel completely off the wall and ripped at a few more wires. With a jolt, the door slid open.

"However much access SIDOS has, he can't make the security here suck any less. It'll probably be more difficult the farther we go down, though... Let's get out of here."

"Good thinking!" Dr. Ez pushed past Nick, on full alert for any dangers that would lie ahead, "We'll have to be careful, constantly on the lookout. If we aren't we're gonna die, pretty fast. This ain't no game, you don't come back after ya' die. If ya' die, that's game over." He started off through the long hallway behind the door.

Jake nodded, and began moving towards the new door. "I'll be in the back, just in case anything tries to follow us." He pushed Nick in the dark tunnel and followed after them, quickly being swallowed up by the darkness.

As Casey started to work on Rook, he noticed some leakage in the power core. Casey grabbed some tools and got to work. Within minutes the power core was back up and running. Casey clamped the connecting wires and pushed them both together in a slot, giving power to Rook.

"A51, find a cooling system add-on," Casey called.

"Yes, great and powerful master," A51 mumbled sarcastically. After finding and installing one, lights started to blink within Rook. She was finally back online.


((so sorry. Stuff has been tearing at my free time for the last few weeks. If you notice any inactivity, that's what it's caused by))

"Well maybe that's a theory. Suppose SIDOS had us all captured already, wiped our memories, and set us in virtual reality to keep us from escaping? Like the Matrix. That movie inspired my entire life, you kno-"

Nicholas decided, wisely, to stop talking. He cautiously led the way into the darkness, down a straight corridor.

"Funny. Shouldn't be this dark down here... Guess the B.M.O.C. shut off all our lighting. Anyone got a match? We can't close that door again, so we need to move as quickly as possible."

[[It's fine Krazzu!]]

((WOOOO! KRAZZ!))

"Uh... no, I don't... I never have them with me, it's a hazard if I have them in my lab... So we'll be running in the dark." Dr. Ez moved along the dark corridor with Jake and Nick.

Jake checked behind him one last time, and saw an explosion of light. Moments later, he saw wood shards blast towards him. "RUN! THEY'RE IN!" He began moving as quickly as he could in the thin hallway, often looking backwards to check if they were catching up.

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ROZ reached Casey. "Back... Woah! This air's really clean! Not like back there, where it was exactly 45% toxic gas. Here it is only at about 3%." Then he noticed Rook was back online. "ROOK! You're back!" He grinned, but then turned serious once again. "We really need to move quickly, back there is gonna explode soon, and I'm amazed it has taken this long... If we are going to survive, we have to hurry as quickly as possible."

“ > System check
 > Check complete
 > Starting up unite Rook”
Said the annoying deep electronic voice, Rook only caught part of what Roz was saying as her hearing came back “ If we are going to survive, we have to hurry as quickly as possible…” as his voice trailed into silence she spoke. “What? What happened? Why aren’t we all dead? I-er or I mean offline or whatever?” The question came out stupidly and she clumsily got up.
“ > Unite Rook system’s check is enabled
 > Power core has been sealed.”
“I know thanks shut up already!” Rook said frustrated “If I could make that thing shut up any day I’d do it.” She muttered.

"Try not to get seperated! I've seen too many horror movies, this is the scene where they start picking us off one by one!"

Nicholas was not a fit man. Sprinting was not something he considered himself good at. Yet, somehow, being pursued by killer robots propelled him forwards down that dark hallway like nothing else. It was an area of study he'd have to look in to later, if he survived the aforementioned killer robots.

Slamming into a wall after several steps, Nicholas realized that the corridor diverged into two branches. "Left or right? Left or right?!?" he shouted at the others, not quite sure in which direction they were.

ROZ noticed Rook standing up. "GOOD! Thanks Casey! I think we all owe ya' one." Then he turned back to Rook. "We aren't dead thanks to Casey got you here after I almost turned offline when moving you, and A51 found us a way out. But the gas leak has not been solved, and either I have to go in there and possible, but not likely, stop the fire and end the leak, or we run like mad and hope our heads don't get blown off." He smiled after saying this, finding it morbidly funny. He looked back at where the gas was coming from and knew that in mere moments their world will be blown up unless they move quickly. "We really have to go now. Casey, get A51, then we need to run."

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"Right!" Jake shoved the two of them into the right corridor. "We really need to go, now. They are right behind us I bet. No sense in looking backwards, just go. GO!" He practically roared the last word, not caring for how loud he was because the robots surely already knew where they were. This idea was cemented by a bullet striking the wall right by them, rich-rocketing all along the tunnel, only to disappear at another bend. "Run! Move!" His voice was becoming haggard with stress.

Dr. Ez nodded and took off in the tunnel, moving as fast as he dared in a small hallway, which was in fact as fast as he possibly could. His feet pounded in the... metal? floor, sending vibrations throughout the hallway, all the way back to the robots and beyond, attracting the attention of something that they definitely wished that they could avoid for the rest of their existences, the so-called "murderbeast".

The creature burst into the laboratory that they had escaped and spent a few moments sniffing at the opening. Then it disappeared, it just... left. The chip in its head was bugging it at the moment. Normally a chip would work in this beast, but it did not always, at time it was one hundred percent under power of others, and at other times it was wild. At this moment, it was wild and it was leaving to get rid of the strange thing that had once been lodged into its brain an from then on had remained a nuisance.

A51 grinned as Rook got back up. "You alright?" he asked.

Casey looked down where they had come from. They needed to get out of there, get down, down as far as they could. "Come on, we need to get going," Casey advised. "Roz is right. If all that gas explodes, this place will be blasted with waves of intense heat. The longer we stay, the higher the risk."

Casey glanced at A51. For the first time, really, he noticed that he had no clue what the mini-lasers on A51's shoulders did."Hey, A51," he said. "What are those lasers? What do they do? I've never seen you use them, even when you're with a guard. And you aren't one to keep a curiosity unexplored."

"My what?" A51 replied. "Oh, those lasers. I... I'm not actually sure, really. I've never actually used them." As a test, A51 turned to the wall opposite the stairs and fired. Two small red beams shot out, hitting the wall.

"Whoa! No! Not in here!" Casey exclaimed in horror. He took a deep breath to calm his racing heart. "Don't use anything superheated here. You could've just ignited the fumes." Casey looked to where the lasers had landed. There were no burn marks. Strange, what was the laser for, if not to attack?